Blood and Ferrocrete (A Shadowrun 3rd edition Game)

Runners gone wild in the streets of Seattle, 2064

Or: Disassociative Compartmentalization

From Samriel’s Mental Journal:
30-09-54 (September 30th, 2054)

Someone once told me that when God closes a door, he opens a window. And generally speaking, I’ve always hated this saying. Why? Because that would make God a total jerk. Because a window is much smaller than a door. So closing the door to open the window would result in a net loss. As opposed to, I don’t know, opening the back door or something. Wouldn’t that be a much better saying?

For most of my life, things have seemed fairly straightforward. I knew what was real. I knew my place in the world, more or less. I mean, I argued with the Professor some since I didn’t think elves are inherantly superior to every other sort of creature. But I still felt relatively sure of my place in the world, as a particularly gifted individual in many respects. I had vast amounts of knowledge gained from some of the wisest entities in the world. I possessed a deeply-ingrained understanding of how magic worked before the Awakening even came.

But, recently I’ve been leading an… interesting life. Monsters that should never exist. Existential crises. Kidnappings for people to mess with my mind using some sort of horrible machine. There’s been.. sort of a lot of things. I mean, it’s been bad enough that I’ve genuinely been questioning my sanity.

So, most of my life I’ve been pretty solid, psychologically speaking. My mind’s been solid and well-refined, and as a result I suppose it’s been rather rigid in most respects. Perhaps that is why I’ve traditionally been very good at concentrating on things, such as individual summonings. I can concentrate as hard as orichalcum rods. But that hasn’t traditionally made me so terribly wonderful at multitasking.

Glitter is always urging me to work, and learn, and grow. She always wants me to push myself to be better, to master new skills, and so on. It’s very endearing, honestly; she wants me to the best me that I can be. But lately the tasks she’s been having me do, trying to concentrate on multiple things simultaneously… have sort of started working.

I don’t know what it is exactly. Maybe my mind is working a little more… fluidly? Maybe it’s less set in its ways to focus on a single thing? Maybe Greg could tell me a little more, as he has a stronger grasp of psychology than I do. But I think I’m sort of learning to split my attention to focus on two things. Glitter calls it compartmentalization. It’s … honestly sort of surreal. I’m not sure if it’s disassociation, or what’s going on.

Essentially I sit there and I concentrate on splitting my mind into fragments. The exercise I’ve been doing lately is that one part of my mind goes looking for a pretend item that I’ve hidden somewhere in my house. Then the other partition of my mind goes looking around the house for the hidden item. Mentally of course. But still, it’s rather surreal. I’m getting to the point where I’m getting really good at hiding things, and I have to concede the game and ask myself where I hid the object. Surreal. But helpful. I’ve just about mastered holding a spell up while forming another one. It’s not as easy as just one, of course, but far easier than it used to be…

Maybe I had to go borderline insane in order to master this new talent. I guess maybe everything really does happen for a reason.

I was awoken – thankfully without a hangover – at seven this evening. It was Murphy. Glitter’s out of town for the last few days, and I need the money, and didn’t really have a reason not to take the job. So I told him I’d be at the Shamrock before ten, which is when he wanted to meet me.

I got my things together. Given how things have been going lately, I made sure to get my helmet. I don’t want of the potentially-arrested people to know precisely what I look like. Less hassle that way. I went to Bruce’s and picked up the Jackrabbit to drive to the meet. He had something to do so wasn’t going to be joining us, but he was kind enough to wish me luck. After the way things had been going with Murphy’s jobs lately, I’d probably need it.

I arrived. There was a new guy there, who didn’t really introduce himself much, but Captain Jack was there, which heartened me a little. Strange guy, but he seems competent at least. Murphy laid out the job: the father of an Ariel Simpson was worried about his daughter. She’d disappeared, but she’d only been missing for about twenty-four hours, so the cops wouldn’t do anything. Murphy said the job would pay fifty grand collectively. Made me curious who the father was, both to get worried so quickly, and to have that much money on-hand. We got chips with the vital data, and examined them for a few minutes. It sounded relatively straight-forward. Most work in the Shadows isn’t all running and gunning and breaking into insanely secure places, so there was nothing all that strange about that.

The new guy introduced himself as Tom. Hispanic-looking fellow. A little declasse, but then that’s not unusual amongst professionals. Tom said he was a driver, which made me glad, since Bruce wasn’t around. Bruce… MacGuyver. Ugh. Honestly the more I think about it, the more I wonder if I shouldn’t call him Bruce either. But I digress. Murphy assured us that Tom comes well-recommended, and is a member of… some group I’d never heard of. But apparently either Murphy is really good at bullshitting me, or it’s genuinely impressive, so I took that as a good omen. Jack negotiated an extra ten grand out of Murphy if we were able to find the girl and return her alive. Murphy agreed, and suggested we make sure that if anyone had hurt the girl, they wouldn’t hurt anyone again.

After looking over the information, I thought the simplest method of dealing with this would be to go to her apartment or dorm room, acquire a usable magical link, and then cast a relatively weak spell along the link, and follow it to its endpoint: the girl. We went to her apartment complex. Two guards, which was sort of impressive in its own way, but nothing we couldn’t handle.

Tom said he was skilled with electronics. So I wove mana about him to make him effectively invisible, and got to try out that Levitation spell I’d learned to see if it would be useful. I levitated him over the fence, and walked about the neighborhood like I was lost or something. Tom broke in, and kept us updated via comms. Inside the apartment everything seemed pretty normal. The girl apparently had a roommate, and Tom collected things from both rooms. He also found a peep-camera hidden behind a poster. He took the samples, I levitated him back over the fence, and we headed back to the van so I could drop the spells.

After releasing the mana flows, I projected and sent myself into the apartment next door, to see what I could see. Feelings of… I don’t know. A twisted mind. Reverence. Desire. Longing. Lust. Admiration. But mostly reverence. There was something strange and tentacled inside an aquarium. There was a little altar sort of thing with a squid-like symbol on it, that had strong feelings. I found a room with a fiberoptic camera I expect it was, and many used tissues. Just being in there made me feel dirty. And then I figured out that I didn’t know what dirty was. I entered a ritual room, I suppose it was. Reverence. Like a place of worship, except it was… strange somehow. Off. Wrong.

I went back to my body and reported on what I’d found. Jack seemed uninterested since the girl wasn’t there. For all I knew there was a murder-torture room beneath the moldy apartment floor, but Jack didn’t care since it wasn’t the job. While professionalism is to be praised, the streak of lack of curiosity, and more importantly the lack of empathy or concern for others lowered my estimation of the man somewhat. Disappointing.

Anyway, so we went to an anonymous motel in the red light district, since I surely wasn’t taking the pair of them out to my farm, or my safehouse, and sure as hell not to Glitter’s place. The guy behind the counter was a racist son of a bitch who wanted twice the usual rate since I’m an elf. I didn’t feel too bad at all for stealing his personal freedom enough to make him think I’d paid him. I got the key, and went to the room.

I set up the ritual space. Jack stayed in the van, but Tom seemed curious, and so I let him watch. It was probably boring for him, as I shaped and concentrated the mana, focusing my desire upon it. After a couple of hours of shaping, I felt the mana reach the target, the girl Ariel. Whether the spell would work or not was immaterial; what mattered was that I was able to follow the link to her location.

I gave directions to Tom and we drove out to the docks. An abandoned-looking area, that Jack said was supposedly haunted. I did astral recon. Three guys wearing armor and carrying big guns standing outside, being guards. An astral barrier inside the warehouse preventing me from seeing much. Oh, and a big kraken in the water right next to the warehouse. It was asleep, at least.

Jack decided we’d hit them hard and fast. Tom drove the van around in a semi-circle while Jack shot the enemies. There was a lot of shooting, and I was playing astral overwatch watching the scene. Guns and bullets aren’t really alive or particularly elemental; they’re not easy to see from the astral. But it was clear everyone was in a fight for their lives, and there were numerous gunshots. The enemies launched grenades at the van, which – thank God – Tom was able to get out of the way of. My body was in that van, after all.

Jack and Tom managed to kill the enemies, I guess, and I broke the barrier in the warehouse. I’m a little surprised my ritual casting made it through the barrier. God was clearly with us; and with Ariel.

What I encountered was… revolting. I expect my poor, injured psyche bears yet another scar from that. The things I’ve seen in this job. It’s like I’m constantly exposed to the worst things in the universe. Things I’d never imagined. Entering the warehouse past the now-destroyed barrier was like… it was like entering a freshly-used charnel house, Auschwitz, and the temple of a demon or some dark god, all rolled into one. The place stank. The mana flows were wrong. Corrupted. Seething. The emotions were all but overwhelming. Fear. Terror, even, since fear doesn’t begin to touch it. Pain. Horror. Revoltion. Desperation. Despair. And yet elation and excitement and reverence, too. Wrong. So wrong.

As I entered, I was evidently just in time to see the culmination of a dark ritual. The girl was laid naked upon an altar. The ritualist drew his blade over her throat, slitting it. From her blood, mana welled up, and it collected in the circle. The ritualist sent it to run along a link to the kraken I’d seen in the water. Some sort of control spell, I could tell. This was… bad.

About this time, I could hear Captain Jack trying to open up the warehouse door. He was having trouble. But like watching a train wreck, I couldn’t take my eyes from the ritual space, watching helpless and unable to help the poor girl in my astral form. Nor could I wreak vengeance upon her killer since he wasn’t astrally active. All I could do is watch. One way or another, it would all be over well before I could get back to my body and come in to intervene.

The ritualist declared words I do not want to remember. Asking the kraken, as if it were some dark god, to come and devour everyone. He asked that it start with him. And, controlled by the spell, it wrapped a tentacle thick around as my waist about the ritualist, brought him to its beak, and bit him in half. The kraken, freed of the ritualist’s spell, returned to the water. And the whole time, I did nothing but watch, dumbfounded and impotent.

I gathered myself as Jack got the door open enough to come in. I appeared as a psychic apparition, and directed him to the girl, whose life was quickly flowing out of her body. Thank the Lord, Jack was able to close the wound enough to stabilize her, following the instructions from his medkit. He brought her out to the van. I didn’t want to stay in the warehouse any longer, and the reek of its foul mana threatened to make me vomit regardless. Returning to my body, I healed the girl as best I could. It was clear from her aura that her life was no longer in danger. Jack stabilized her, and I brought her back from the brink of death, but she’ll still likely bear a scar, and she lost a lot of blood. Truly, the Lord was with her, and with us. We managed to save a girl from a dark fate. Regardless of the horrors I saw in there, and the unnatural workings of mana the ritualist had employed, I was able to help save that girl from a horrible fate. For that, I’m truly thankful.

We called Murphy, and he told us to bring her to the hospital. We did. Murphy paid us the twenty grand each he’d promised. Which is nice. Money is useful. But we saved a girl. We did some good. She’ll probably be scarred physically and psychicly. But she has her life. And she has a chance. And that is something I’ve gotten to do far too little in this job: help someone.

Have you (the hypothetical You, of course, since this is all inside my head… unless it’s not?) ever made a bargain with a free spirit? Most of them are relatively uninterested in money or material gain in general. Makes sense if you think about it, since they’re essentially beings of thought and emotion, not of physical reality. So maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise that when you bargain with a free spirit, they don’t want money or material goods, generally speaking. What they want, is something they cannot attain for themselves: the human experience.

Free spirit are intelligent, self-aware entities. They seem neither to be angels nor demons. Perhaps they’re related to the demi-beings spoken of in Genesis, when angels knew men and women. Perhaps it still happens on occasion. In any case, they’re sentient, even if it’s not precisely a human intelligence. They’re not stupid for the most part, it’s just they are different than us, and have different priorities and thought processes. Despite being sentient, however, even free spirits, with their own will and desires, are mostly static entities. They are birthed (as it were) full-grown, knowing more or less everything they’ll ever know. They don’t change, don’t grow, don’t learn the same way we humans do. If it’s important to them, they’ll remember you, certainly. But they won’t spontaneously learn to throw a fireball if they weren’t birthed with that knowledge. Bound spirits never change. But despite being primarily static, free spirits have the /potential/ to do so. It’s just hard.

The exception to this rule of stasis are those free spirits who make bargains with humanity. Spirits have many things they can do, as well as thoughts, experiences, and knowledge that humans simply don’t. Understanding spirits, even free ones, is like trying to imagine what a creature from the bottom of the sea thinks. It’s foreign; alien even. But regardless, they have or can do various things that humans desire. And in exchange, the free spirit takes pieces of their experience.

I spent this evening with Sunflower. Not today, of course, since like many elves and many shadowrunners I prefer to sleep much of the day. So I spent the evening with Sunflower. I snuck into a neighboring cornfield near the farm, and we played hide and seek for some hours, and some light gymnastics, and a few other things. She even likes word games. I’d never seen a spirit that so strongly resembled a child. She’s playful, mischevious, full of wonder and excitement. She likes to play pranks on people, which may result in the occasional bump or scrape, but she’s not malevolent about it in the slightest. We played until well after midnight, as I was starting to tire rather badly. While playing, though, between bouts of losing myself in her childlike enthusiasm, I couldn’t help but think about this.

When you give a free spirit bits of your experience, it’s both the emotional and personal impact of the memory granted, as well as its personal significance, that you give up. Lord knows I must be an expert on it by now, I’ve given enough bits and pieces to Glitter over the last year. You still retain the memory, but it’s… it’s like it’s greyed out somehow. You remember the factual information about it. You remember what happened, and can see in your mind’s eye from your perspective. You don’t lose the memory. But it’s… disconnected somehow, if you give it up to a free spirit. It no longer has any emotional impact. You could give up the most terrifying memory you have, and thinking about it wouldn’t scare you anymore. The soul of the memory is gone, as if it happened to another person or you read about it in a book. It’s still there, but something vital is gone from it. It loses its power. It loses its impact.

Honestly, it sort of makes me wonder if free spirits are the source of lore regarding the fae. For all the Tir na nOg elves enjoy playing at seelie and unseelie courts, a being of inhuman morality and conscience doing things the way its nature dictates reminds me too much of certain stories of the fae. And some fae are grave and honorable, while others are shameless if innocent tricksters, while others are malevolent entities interested in violence and suffering. And many of them were interested in what humanity could give them. A soul. A child. Things the fae lacked.

Back on topic, perhaps it would be good for me, to give up some of the more painful memories I’ve accumulated over the last couple of years. God certainly knows the horrors I’ve seen would have driven many people off the deep end by now. Sometimes I can’t help but doubt my own sanity. If I could get rid of the sting of some of these memories, of the horrors, of the Things Which Should Not Be, I bet I’d feel a lot better.

These are some of the things I thought about as I played with Sunflower. I’ve always been prone to thinking too much. It makes me excellent in study and academic studies and a number of other things, but too much thinking certainly doesn’t lead to happiness. Perhaps that’s why I value my time with Sunflower quite highly. It’s not perfect, but in fits and starts I’m able to stop thinking for a while.

Greg’s been teaching me more about psychology, and the workings of the mind. I… am not entirely certain he’s all there, the more time I spend with him. As a result, I’m hesitant to open up to him too much. He seems to have good intentions, and despite being a professional criminal I can honestly say I think he’s a good person, aside from his penchant for brutally forcing his will upon others. I haven’t yet figured out if it’s worse to harm someone physically, or to take away their freedom of thought, their capacity for self-determination. Anyway, he’s offered to listen. He seems very sympathetic. But the fact that he doesn’t seem to be quite all there makes it hard to confide in him very much.

It might be better for me to give up some of these more painful memories. The ones that scar me too badly. A certain amount of pain is a natural thing. It helps us grow stronger, it builds our will and determination. But maybe some of these memories aren’t so much just pain, but some sort of psychic leaking wound. Taking the pain too far could be crippling.

The thing that really bothers me about this whole train of thought is: if free spirits gain power, knowledge, experience, through this trade, then mightn’t the content of the experiences given up matter? If I gave to Sunflower my terror, my nausea, my revoltion, the sheer unholiness of my memory of Madame Ulisha’s true self… what would that do to Sunflower, the bright and innocent and exhuberant girl? Would it be like taking a child and beating her, terrorising her, giving her horrors nobody should ever have to experience? If our memories, our experiences, are what grant a level of dynamism to free spirits, then perhaps just as we are shaped by our experiences, free spirits are also shaped by the experiences they inherit.

Intellectually I’m curious, but it would be beyond immoral to experiment on the topic. Just the thought of risking something like that with a spirit like Sunflower, or – God forgive me – Glitter makes me want to wretch. However intellectually curious I might be, the thought of either of them gaining such experiences is terrifying.

So where does that leave me? It may be possible to get rid of some of these psychic scars. They hurt. But I’d never wish such horrors upon my worst enemy, much less someone I love, or someone as kind and innocent as Sunflower. God is good, and so he would never give me trials I could not get through. The question is, is finding a way out of the situation the trial I’ve been given, or is learning to cope with it the trial He’s given me? Greg could probably alter or remove some of those memories. But would that be just taking the easy way out?

In either case, I couldn’t risk giving either of the free spirits those sorts of memories, just in case it should have an effect on them. Instead I’ll give them bits of my joy, my pleasure, my happiness. It dampens my life but a little, but should they ever gain truly bad experiences, it may give them strength, and seeing either of them laugh or smile or dance or sing fills me with joy anew. And I thank you, Lord, for that.

Now, perhaps I’ll go get a bottle of taengele, and pay Scarpy a visit before the sun comes up. Glitter’s away and I’ve no desire to go home alone, and I should stop ruminating.

Or: How I Spent A Run Relaxing In The Tank

Or: How I Could’ve Gone To a Nice Party, But Babysat Instead. Badly.

From Samriel’s Mental Journal:
27-09-54 (September 27th, 2054)

I got a call from Murphy the other day. I’m starting to wonder if it’s really the best idea to do jobs for Murphy. He keeps setting me up with people who don’t know what they’re doing, and I don’t know why. He owes me a favor. Does he have some sort of vendetta against me? Or does he get to keep the shares for people who die? I must learn more about how fixers get paid, because this baffles me somewhat.

So, when I got the call, I was getting ready to go to a party with Glitter. The guy who played Karl the Kombat Mage was throwing a charity gala, and Glitter asked me to go as her date. So we were in the middle of getting ready, when Murphy called. He said it’d pay a minimum of five grand, so reluctantly I decided to go ahead and take the job. Glitter was mildly annoyed, considering she has shoes that cost more than five grand, but since I blew all that money on the Se’lahan weapon focus, I can’t turn down money for no reason. So… instead of going to the party, I went down to the Shamrock. And the meeting that I skipped the party for? Took twenty minutes. I could’ve phoned in my presence, or let Bat- … no, I still just can’t call him that. I could’ve let Bruce be my proxy for it or something, for all the good my presence was.

Bella Rose was there, which seemed like it would bode poorly for the mission. But… money. So I stayed. Murphy outlined the job: pick up a man from the parking lot of Dante’s Inferno and protect him for a couple of days until his plane arrived. Now, at the meeting, I saw a guy wearing a Roman-style helmet and carrying a riot shield. That… didn’t bode well either. One of them arrived in a Eurocar Westwind, which was evidently not armored, and not exactly subtle… so… yeah. Murphy offered the veterans among us an extra three grand if all the new guys came back alive.

I went with Bruce in his veritable tank, since I trust him to drive and it’s a safe place for my body. And I took a nap in the tank while we were waiting. Bruce and I made sure to arrive early, so I could scout the place out. I saw a drunk guy, and a terrified guy, probably our client. So we waited for the others to show up. They did.

At four in the morning, on time, Jack got out of his car. The drunk fellow asked Jack the pass-phrase, and Jack gave the countersign. Right as the client came out from further in the alley, a racing car came toward us at high speed. People started shooting at it like crazy. It blew up. There were apparently a couple of teenagers in it. Apparently they were street racers or something. Poor, unfortunate souls.

Shortly thereafter, just after we got the client into the FOX, we saw some SUVs following us along the road. More shooting ensued, resulting in an SUV being disabled. And the enemies apparently disabled the Westwind, from the sounds of it on the radio. From the sounds of it, the two people in the Westwind got themselves killed by the enemy with fully automatic weapons. Bruce sent one his drones in to protect the others, which mowed down a few guys.

About the time all the fighting ended I was finally able to get astral. By then we were miles away from the fighting and things seemed to be over. Bruce took us to his … to his home, and we piled into his big-rig, and we drove around occasionally for the next several days.

Finally, Monday arrived and we let our client board his plane, and we got paid. And a few minutes later, the plane blew up. It wasn’t until after the events that we heard back from Iceman regarding our client. Apparently the Yakuza had put out a quarter-million nuyen bounty. And we got paid five grand. No bonus since the new guys mostly died.

All in all, I got paid five grand for missing the party. I didn’t really do much of value, except feel a little bad for the dead people. Darwinism, I guess.

Or: I couldn't think of a more clever title.

From Samriel’s Mental Journal:
16-09-54 (September 17th, 2054)

Lately, I just sigh quietly to myself when I think about my life. You know, there was a time when I was respected. I was well-renowned in the field of magical research. I had money, free time, professional and intellectual fulfilment from my job, I was spiritually at peace, mentally energetic. Things were good.

And then, something happened. And I don’t even know what. All anyone could tell me was that there was an accident at the lab, and everything was destroyed, and I was in a coma for just over a year. And that’s… all I know. I don’t know what happened, or if it was even something I did, or something else entirely. And when I woke up? All my savings was gone. My girlfriend had left me. My lab was destroyed. And I was blackballed by every magical research corporation on the bloody planet after the incident with the lab. And so, for lack of other options and trying to figure out a way to learn about something new and interesting to restore my reputation. I did alright for a couple of months, and then Charlotte hooked me up with Murphy. And nothing’s been bloody predictable since then.

For example:

Last night I got a call from Murphy, asking if I had time for a quick job for him. I didn’t really have anything major going on, so I said sure, and drove on into the city to the Shamrock. I parked and went into the bar and headed for the war room. There I found Captain Jack and a new person, a mohawked redhead human woman who identified herself as Bella Rose.

The job was pretty simple. We were told to be at Pier 39 at 2am to pick up a package from a hispanic man in a Zodiac, with the passphrase that “K” sent us. We’d get the package, and take it to 160 1st Street in Redmond, which was a dilapidated 4-story tenament building with a post office box in front of it. We were to yell “Kolmetz” and then once it was picked up, leave. Lacking a car, we rented Murphy’s van. Jack was able to determine that there was a gang of trolls in the area, named the Dockers, both because they’re dock-workers and due to the excellent pants that they wear. I wasn’t much excited by the five hundred nuyen Murphy was offering, but since he’d said he was doing the job for a friend, I said I’d do it for him as a favor rather than going home. He figured it’d cost him more than five hundred nuyen in the end, but agreed to owe me a favor if I did the job.

We spoke with K-Fin to acquire drugs to give to the Dockers, and K-Fin offered us a pair of yellow pills he located in his car somewhere and didn’t know what it was. And Bella Rose… ate them. Right there. Right before the job, she consumed the pills of unknown drugs. I don’t know what effects she was experiencing, but after she barely got into the van, and started being annoying, I asked Jack if I should knock her out. And Jack agreed. So I stunbolted her so she could sleep it off. And then, since we had time to kill, Jack decided he wanted to go to Wenches ‘N’ Grog, the local pirate bar.

As we pulled up, someone tossed a grenade into the parking lot. We parked and Jack went in. I watched them play strange pirate games, wondering what it is about my life that I’ve wound up here. I banged my head on the steering wheel after one of the pirates fell into the water from some cargo netting. Maybe I’m being tested, in some sort of Job-like manner. I don’t know.

Speaking of being tested, when I hit my head on the steering wheel, I accidently hit the horn, and it attracted the attention of a couple of drunken pirates, who proceeded to tell me about Jack’s adventures in lecherousness. I tried to laugh at the appropriate junctures to avoid offending them. During this, Bella Rose evidently woke up, and left the van, and went into the bar. Loud fighting ensued. And so did more banging my head on the steering wheel. Bella Rose comes back, sobered up some, and we proceed with the actual job.

We went down to the docks and I went to scout the place out. Five trolls. Nothing astrally interesting. So Jack and Bella Rose went to talk to the gangers while I played astral overwatch. Jack gave them the drugs, and then apparently Bella Rose was still high and sort of wandered off or something. So I worked on guarding Jack from the astral.

A Zodiac came up to the dock after Jack set up the signal device. Hispanic. Not very interesting. About that time, I saw an astral metahuman who looked like he was a detective, who identified himself as being there in an official capacity and I needed to leave. I told Jack over the mindlink what happened, and headed back for my body, about the time bright lights came on.

I drove Murphy’s van over to pick Jack up because things were going hairy, and pulled up alongside without stopping, the door open. Jack leapt in, looking rather impressive I thought, even if it was a little insane. I punched it (as best as a van can be said to do so) and headed for the highway, and merged into traffic. Astrally projecting once I turned on the auto-nav, I watched for pursuit. And the imp I’d summoned showed me the… well, anymore I can’t even say it was the most revolting thing I’ve ever seen. Blood spirits had been hypothesised, but… somehow assensing it by proxy at least, it felt… wrong.

So, we drove to Redmond, and dropped off the package. The tall robed and cowled figure came out to retrieve the package. He gave us our money, and he gave me an odd chip. I’m interested to know what it has on it. Surprisingly, Jack declined the chip. And so I went home. I don’t know where Bella Rose went to.

Or Vash's Wild Ride

The Shamrock is actually jumping when Murphy calls the usual suspects. Bella has been at the bar since about 1400 steadily drinking Guiness and bulldrekking with Patrick and later K-Fin. Murphy has a client that needs protection for the weekend and to be put on a plane out in the Salish on Monday morning. He rings Samriel who agrees to drive in, Bella agrees to hear him out, he calls Captain Jack who was asleep and goes back to sleep.
Then his phone starts ringing. He lets it roll over to voice mail and learns that Arnie has been giving his name out. Some chick named Vi wants work. He tells her to be at the Shamrock at 2100
His phone blows up again. Voicemail again then he calls the guy back. Some dude named Vash also needs work. Sure he thinks more the merrier. 2100,chum
He’s just settled in and about to talk to Bella when his phone goes off again. Jeez, Arnie, didja take out an ad in the Post? Voicemail then some chick named Karla wants in as well. 2100
On a whim, he calls BatDwarf and the caped rigger agrees to be there. Bruce fires up the FOX and rolls out of his secret cave entrance.

Vi, a redhead in a skintight dress, shows up first, having driven her crappy antique Buick Regal from the Redlight district. She introduces herself then putters around the bar.

Vash jumps into his sleek SILVER Westwind and roars off from the Seattle Hilton. He arrives a few minutes later and strolls in, an imposing figure in his dark coat and Roman war helm.

Karla, an ebony skinned woman in a red dress, rolls in a few minutes later. When she takes her coat off, its obvious she thought nothing of walking through the Redlight district at night because she has a Predator in a thigh holster and a pair of katanas with a heavy crossbow on her back.

Captain Jack gets up, straps his usual gear on and heads out to his antique but restored Toyota Tundra pickup, The Rum Punch Express, so named for the passenger compartment rum dispensers built into it.

He arrives at the bar ..and Patrick pulls out a Predator and sets it on the bar and looks meaningfully at Jack. (Jack shot the trid during the last run cause Pat wouldn’t change the channel). ‘Gonna be destroying any o me property tonight boyo?’ Jack says no but would Pat mind terribly changing it to rugby. Pat puts the Pred away and changes the channel.

Samriel exits off the interstate and cruises by the pub. Crappy Buick, Crappy Toyota, The Batdwarfmobile, a silver? I didn’t even know it came in any color but red or black Westwind and Murphy’s panel van crowding the lot. He decides to park at 5th street parking and walk back.

The War Room is standing room only and there are some who gets a chair antics. Finally the team is settled and Murphy does his white noise generator tridscreen trick. A young fresh faced man appears on the screen. ‘This is the client, Allan Smythe. He needs protection. The gig pays 5000 each for 3 days work. He wants to meet you in the parking lot of Dante’s at 0400. He’ll ask you for the time and you’ll reply that your watch is broke. Any questions?’ Of course the team haggles a bit and Samriel gets Murphy to bump the payout to 8K if all the newbies come back in one piece. Murphy gets an evil look on his face as he turns to his kit bag and begins pulling out….flowers. Boutineers to be precise. “Everyone has to wear one of these when you meet him so he knows you’re from me.”

Everyone agrees some reluctantly. Then theres a pell mell of confusion as to who’s riding with whom. The caravan winds up being Vi and Vash in the Westwind, BatDwarf, Samriel, and Bella in the FOX and Captain Jack and Karla in the Rum Punch Express. The team breaks to collect gear and catch a nap before the run. Unfortunately for Captain Jack, Karla oversleeps and misses the run entirely so he has to roll solo.

They arrive at the proper time and park across from the now closed nightclub. Samriel goes astral and reports back that there are two people in that alley over there. One of them begins staggering towards the trio of cars. Captain Jack gets out to intercept him. Its a grizzled street person who mutters ‘Hey uh got tha time’ Jack says ‘I lost my watch’ The bum says ‘ok foller me’. Jack, Vi, Vash and Bella all begin to follow a complete stranger into a dark alley.

They soon meet and collect Allan. As they are headed back to cars, screeching tires as a riced up Honda 3200 screams around the corner. BatDwarf launches the Fox forward on a collison course while Bella stands in the road. Vi dives for cover. Vash and Captain Jack pull thier guns and Pulp Fiction style blast the drivers compartment. The innocent street racer and his girlfriend are hit by multiple EX rounds and die. The Honda crashes into a wall.

The team shoves the principal into the FOX and Bella clambers in after him. Jack jumps into the Express, and Vi and Vash get in the Westwind as a blacked out SUV turns the corner and begins pursuing the FOX. Jack makes the block to get in trail position as V Squared pull alongside in the Westwind. The windows on the passenger side of the SUV buzz down and two broken nose snouts of AK97 submachineguns poke out. Vi pulls her handcannon and fires past Vash’s face, holing the SUV’s engine. Simultaneously, Captain Jack switches hands and fires the Flintlock of Doom, blowing out a rear tire and shattering the rear glass. The SUV comes to a halt as Vash, blinded and deafened by having a heavy pistol fired 2 inches from his nose, careens off the road to come to a screeching halt in a nearby lot.

Four hitters bail out of the SUV. Two turn towards the Express, two towards the Westwind. Captain Jack pulls down a side street and then clever fragger that he is doubles back to the firefight on foot. The Westwind pair advance on the car, triggering burst after burst, shredding the engine and paint job. A trio of 7.62mm rounds shatters the passengers glass and Vi is hit in the chest and neck. She flops over into Vash’s lap spraying blood and the Predator thumps into the foot well. The door gull wings up as Vash bails out, riot shield in hand.
Captain Jack peeks around the corner and fires the Flintlock O’ Doom. One of his merc targets is nearly eviscerated as his guts explode. He drops like a string cut puppet.
BatDwarf still speeding away launches the Guardian Hunter Killer drone and sends it back as air support, ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ playing from onboard speakers.
The second Westwind mercenary turns at the sound of the approaching drone and is shredded as .50 rounds from the onboard heavy machinegun mow him down.
Seeing this the other Express merc decides on the better part of valor and legs it.
Vash fires wildly over the top of the car, pegging his target with two shots. The merc stumbles but sprays fire back doing more damage to the only silver Westwind ever made.
The angry drone spins in place and walks the heavy machinegun fire up the mercenary killing him very very dead.

With all of the gunfire and commotion, lights begin coming on as the entire neighborhood wonders how they woke up in Beirut. Sirens begin to wail in the distance as Vi bleeds out and gasps her last in the front seat of the only silver Westwind Shadowrun will ever see.

Captain Jack climbs back into the Rum Punch Express and drives casually away, cause speeding draws attention.
BatDwarf recalls the Guardian and inside the FOX Samriel runs a bug scanner over the client. Give me your phone he commands. Allan resists until Bella threatens him then he gives it over. The phone sails out the window to shatter into useless junk and the BDMobile roars away into the night.

Finding himself abandoned by his so-called ‘team’ with a dead chick in his front seat, Vash panicks. He runs to the first car parked on the street and slams his fist through the window of the Jackrabbit. An alarm wails and the owner, a cranky ork in boxers with a shotgun comes out yelling ’Fool! You done tried to jack the wrong ride!" Vash sprints away

He’s overtaken a block later by a Lone Star cruiser that follows him for a bit before announcing on the loudspeaker ‘Stop running, jackass! We will shoot you, we’re the Star!‘. Vash darts down a narrow alley and sprints to the next block over. He kicks in a door to a house, setting off the burglar alarms. Lights come on in the upstairs as he tries to hide in the kitchen. ’Oh you fucked up, son. I’m a UCAS Marine and it’s your ass’ a voice growls. Vash can hear footsteps coming down the stairs so he throws himself out the window. Or tries. The window is plexiglass and he comically rebounds off of it, landing flat on his back and losing his cool helmet in the process. He jumps up and pulls a revolver firing at the window to crack it so he can try again. He’s more than a little surprised when he’s nearly blown out the window by the concussion grenade the former Marine tossed in the kitchen.

He gets up sans revolver and legs it, He slides his riot shield on his back which saves his life as former Sergeant Cook shoots him twice. Vash is nearly knocked off the fire escape ladder but he keeps climbing. A round punches through his bicep and he falls, knocking the wind out of him again. He stands up only to get shot twice more in the guts. He’s bleeding profusely and staggering as he stumbles away from the angry Marine. He makes it to end of the alley and collapses into Otis’ cab. In a cloud of celery and praise to Allah, he’s delivered to Patch’s clinic. He deposits his armor and weapons and on his last legs is finally allowed to see the doc. Unfortunately his wounds (four gunshot wounds, hairline fractured skull, massive blood loss and infection) prove too much and Vash dies on the table.

The rest of the team takes Allan to the BatDwarfCave where they load up the Monstrosity and proceed to spend the rest of the weekend out of town. They tolerate Allans whining and find out he’s got a 250 K bounty on his head for killing a Yakuza honcho while drunk at a pacinko parlor. His dad a up and coming corper is bailing him out constantly and apparently going to do it again

Monday morning, Unknown Salish airstrip. The Monstrosity rumbles into view and stops near an ancient cracked runway. Allan looking way less fresh stumbles down the ramp into the daylight and calls Murphy ‘I guess they did an ok job’. He then waits. A plane touches down and he enters. The team hears muffled arguing as it takes off again and then a clear gunshot. They see a small dot hurled from the plane to splatter on the mountains below. Guess Daddy got tired of paying the bills and cleaning up messes, neh?

The team returns to the Cave collects their cars and head to the pub where Murphy pays them.

The Shamrock is pretty quiet when Murphy makes a few calls to see who wants to do a quick job for him. Samriel, and Captain Jack pick up their phones and agree to meet about 2100 at the pub. When they arrive, apparently there’s a new chick in town. This mohawked redhead is apparently a merc of some sort going by the moniker Bella Rose and the three settle into the War Room to hear the details.

They are to be at Pier 39 at 0200 to pickup a package and deliver it to a certain address in Redmond. Simple, neh? They are going to be paid 500 yen each cause its easy peasy. Discussion is had as to who has a vehicle and which one is taken. In the end, the team winds up renting Murphy’s panel van for 100y each. Then Captain Jack makes a few calls since the waterfront is his stomping grounds. His buddy lets him know that the Dockers, a troll gang, like to hang out there. The team decides they will go with the offering drugs to the gang to have them piss off.

K-Fin resident pool shark/drug dealer is called and arrives in a cloud of Axe body spray a little while later hauling his crate o’ goodies TM. He digs past the porn chips, bits and odds and ends of crappy personal defense stuff and comes up with three vials of slab, a sheet of bliss tabs and two oddly shaded yellow pills. Haggling ensues and the team pays 200 y for the drugs. Bella to everyone’s shock buys the two pills and then immediately takes them.

She finds out the hard way that being both hypersensititve to stimuli and having her reactions slowed (Hyper and MAO don’t mix, mkay?) is a trip. Much consternation on the parts of her teammates causes Samriel to stunbolt her as soon as she’s in the van. Then the team has to kill a couple hours to let her sleep it off. The decision is made to head for Wenches & Grog, the local pirate hangout.

When they arrive, someone tosses a grenado in the parking lot which explodes. Said tosser is launched off the balcony into the sea. Laughing pirates are playing Race the Rigging (a cargo net up the side of the building.) and Captain Jack heads in for a grog. He’s greeted at the door with a series of cheers and jeers. Dark Charlotte, a lecherous dwarf pirate wench, tries to latch onto him but Captain Jack cleverly avoids that by having his mate Thin Redbeard take the hit. He’s having his grog and slinging the drek when Coughin’ Chris and Redjack Ryan get into an argument…

Outside, Samriel is approached by two equally ugly and equally drunk pirates, Pirate Steve and Pirate Chuck. They were going to mess with the lone elf in a van but he lets them know that Captain Jack is his running partner. Inside, they begin a long winded and drunken tale of the death of the Fearful Barnacle. Bella wakes up at all the commotion and decides to go get a grog to clear her head. She walks into a full-on bar brawl and proceeds to nonchalantly make her war to the bar. She vaults onto the countertop just as the barkeep goes down from a clout to the skull with a grog tankard. She removes the tankard from a flailing hand and drains it.

Bella apparently draws power from the grog because she hops down, ducks a flying chair, grabs a cutlass wielding hand and takes possession of the blade by the simple expedient of a size 6 in the family jewels, continues towards the door, is accosted by a pirate, pins the scalawag to the wall through his bloused shirt and exits next to Captain Jack.

Finally finally the team is ready to go on the run. They get to the dock and Samriel goes astral and has a chat with a nice federal mage whos on overwatch. He notices the delivery boat, the drone following it, and the two cigarette boats out in the Sound waiting for delivery.

Captain Jack and Bella head towards where five high Dockers are trying to heave a Bulldog Stepvan into the water. One of them drops the van and the rest are griping at him so Jack has to step out into the open to talk to them. Bella hangs back at the corner, covering the massive gangers with her slivergun. Jack gives them the sheet of Bliss and the trolls toss the van in the drink and head off to find more vehicles to send to a watery grave.

Bella gets an urgent text and has to bolt from the run.

Jack steps out on the dock as a Zodiac inflatable buzzes up. A Hispanic man mid-40s exchanges the passphrase with him. He heaves the package a 3’long footlocker at Jack. Captain Jack is entirely familiar with Heave Ho cause how else do you unload booty from a plundered and sinking ship? He catches the package squarely on his shoulder as LIGHTS suddenly pop on. ‘UCASCUSTOMSANDIMMIGRATION!!! FREEZEYOUSLAGS!!!’ Captain Jack does none of that. Clutching the box, he sprints down the dock towards the alley calling for Samriel to bring the van and leave the side door open.

Samriel does as requested and as the van clears the end of the alley, Captain Jack leaps inside. He deposits the box and draws his flintlock. ‘Got a watcher followin us’. He leans out the open van door as Samreil speeds away and pegs the surviellance drone with two explosive rounds. The drone operator decides along with the rest of the task force to ignore the runners in favor of the gigantic blood spirit that appears in the Sound.

Our intrepid duo heads for the address in Redmond. A crumbling tenement with an old US Postal mailbox. “KOLMETZ!!” they chorus and a tall figure in a cowled robe comes out of a locked basement door. His weird voice resonates as he says ‘Ahh my prize.’ He opens the footlocker to reveal row upon row of BTL chips. He offers one to each of the runners. Captain Jack is having none but Samriel’s curiousity gets the better of him and he takes it. He also assenses Kolmetz and shows him as a mundane. Then Kolmetz’s coat starts moving by itself in weird places and the guys decide they’ve had a long enough night. They get back to bar and get paid the remaining 300y each by Pat since Murphy went home.

Drek, who am I even writing this for. Maybe some nobody will compile this drek in to my memoirs. Haha, fraging likely story. Maybe i’ll have a laugh when my memory starts to go.

So got the numbers of a couple of orc chicks on the job today, the type who know how to handle a weapon, if you get my meaning. Becky and Betsy they were called, twins at that, havn’t been with twins in years, not since that time when we accidentally sank the Fearful Barnacle, May her hull rest in pieces.
Anyway, they were body-guarding, some guy called Orlando or some drek like that. He was treating them like hired thugs, trying to use those two pretty faces to bully his way past me in to a meet he was late or not invited too. Can’t be having that, anyway, said as much too, pretty sure i talked them over and they wouldn’t have gotten involved, after all they did leave me their number. Luckily our friendly neibourhood star stopped by, saving their professional allegiance from being tested. Just as well
Other than that, just a nother day on the job, tell a lie, lonestar want to give me the key to the city…. eh would ya believe that, all for blowing up some drek.

We left Chicago after we submitted the film. Chicago’s been hard to deal with, and I’d been wanting to get away ever since Madame Ulisha. It seems the rest of the group finally decided to agree with me, and we trucked our way Westward to Seattle. To home. We met up with the Wendigos on the way for a little bit, and introduced them to our newest friend. Rodney’s good company. We watched Superman. The first one, with Christopher Reeve. Drank a little. Talked about things that weren’t reality-warping. It was good.

You know, it happened without me ever noticing. I’d never really thought of the farm as home. Nor Seattle, really. It had just been the place I lived, while trying to find a way to repair my reputation. But like far too many things in life, you don’t always notice these things until they’re past. Driving up the dirt road to the farm, stepping out, the familiar smells of the agri-crops… Noir about killed me trying to trip me, she was rubbing herself all around my legs and purring… sitting down on the couch in the living room, with my book on the table neatly marked… holding Noir and petting her… Glitter coming home and giving me one of her warmest smiles. For everything I’ve lost, I’ve also made precious gains. I need to remember to be more thankful for those. I’d returned home again, never before having realized how dear it all is to me, what a precious gift it is.

The next day I went to visit Farshorn, and let him know I was back. It had been months and I’d missed him. I had learned a couple of interesting tricks, becoming so adept at healing spells, which he was quite interested in; he taught me a few as well. We talked well into the morning. I’d missed him. I also went to see Sofia Leadbetter. Neither she nor Farshorn really knew anything about my life in the Shadows; they’d thought I was away on a consulting job. So I hadn’t talked to Sofia in some ages either. We talked, catching up, even if mostly all I did was listen, and I brought her a bottle of sweet ice wine and thanked her profusely for looking after Noir while I was gone. I need to do something more to thank her. She really did an important favor for me when I was in a tight spot, despite not knowing me that well. I intend not to forget that, and will find a way to repay her kindness.

I spent the next couple of days getting back into the rhythm of things. Meeting people, making friends, getting introductions, that kind of thing. Nothing too exciting, but useful and productive nevertheless.

Then yesterday, just after going to bed, I got a call from Murphy. I was surprised. I’d heard his bar was attacked; I’d assumed they’d got him. Evidently not. He asked if I was free for some work. Just asked for me, so I didn’t call anyone else up. Agreeing, I told him I’d need some time to get there, but that I would. While the car drove itself to the Shamrock – which evidently existed again – I made some inquiries and kind of pieced together some things. It would appear as though Murphy survived, and took some vengeance against the Vory for destroying his bar. Which meant I was in part responsible for what happened to his place of business. Which meant I owed him.

Arriving at the Shamrock, I found a parking space and went in. The bartender pointed me toward the “war room,” and to my surprise I found Calico Jack already there. Deciding not to make it clear we’d come back together – Erebus is dead, after all – I greeted him like we’d known each other some time back, and Murphy laid out the job for us: at noon that day there would be a meeting. At noon the doors would be sealed. At 1pm, the doors would be opened and the meeting would be concluded. We were to provide security. Oh, and the meeting would be /today/ and it was already almost eleven. For this hour of work we would be paid 2500 nuyen. I owed Murphy; I wasn’t going to try negotiating. Though given the pay involved I didn’t expect it would be a walk in the park, either.

We went to the location, Maynard Pavillion, near Freeway Park, just a few blocks from the Shamrock, to check it out as best we could. We looked around the building and the area around it, familiarizing ourselves and coming up with basic strategies. I called up a horde of imps, and set them in groups of two at each door; one to come warn me of intruders while the other tried to stop them. I also set Tempest above the building, and Grunt beneath it. Murphy showed up and entered the building; so did several others. At noon, the doors locked, and the Captain and I began our vigil.

Five or ten minutes after noon, a big man with two female ork bodyguards and a pair of bound elementals showed up. I was invisible and watching, while Calico Jack patrolled. Jack went up to the big guy, who identified himself as Rolando. Rolando was clearly very full of himself and incensed that we would dare to stop him. I readied my demons to attack and prepared to begin banishing Rolando’s bound spirits if necessary. Calmly, Calico Jack talked to Rolando and made it clear. Just as I thought things might come to blows, a patrolling security mage stopped and inquired as to whether there’s a problem or not. Rolando backed down finally, promising that he wouldn’t forget about this. And the park became quiet again. Kids playing, joggers running around, that sort of thing.

A little after that, /another/ person showed up and started talking to me despite being invisible. A quiet, furtive-looking fellow inquired as to what we were doing there. He introduced himself as Scarpy. I assured him that we weren’t there to cause any trouble for the park or anything, without actually explaining what we were there for. I figured it was obvious we were guarding the place. Scarpy seemed molified, and went off back to a place in the trees where he apparently made his home.

And then frizbees and balls and pigeons and things started flying at us at apparently random. It was pretty obviously magical. I spotted a field spirit that looked like a little girl. A free field spirit, interestingly, using her Accident power on people. I offered to play with her for a whole hour later, if she’d let us concentrate on our job here without accidents. She readily agreed.

Soon enough, several drones buzzed over the building, and paused somewhere out of my sight to fire their guns. We tensed, but the drones left again without trying to start anything. Apparently they were part of the nearby security conference, showing off the latest model of murder-bots.

Calico Jack and I had settled into a good set-up. I was stationary and was watching around, while my spirits also watched. Captain Jack was patrolling around the building on an irregular circuit. Just when I’d thought that every possible hazaard in the world had finally showed up and we’d dealt with it, Scarpy comes back out and points Jack to “Hugh,” who had been acting funny apparently. Jack went to investigate. I was watching for spirits and living things, so I wasn’t much paying attention, truth be told.

I found out later that Captain Jack smelled something odd from the gardener drone. He investigated. He picked it up and put it in a trash can. It cut its way out after a minute. And then, according to Calico Jack, it began to charge toward the building. So he decided to… shoot the gardener drone. I wasn’t much aware of any of this since he didn’t radio me about it.

The next thing I knew, there was an enormous, earth-shattering explosion. Heat and light washed over me, and I goggled a bit, trying to piece together what just happened. Clearly, it was bad; I hope nobody was hurt. Although as full as the park was, I fear I probably won’t get that hope. Murphy came out of the building and said the meeting was over, and the Fixers began to depart quickly. At Calico Jack’s urging, so did we. Calico Jack said he wanted to rough it in the barrens until the heat blew over. He didn’t seem to feel that a proper safehouse was all that important. Personally I intended to head for Tarislar.

I’d just arrived at my Tarislar apartment when I tripped and smacked my face into the wall rather painfully. The free Field Spirit was quite incensed that I’d apparently lied to her about playing with her. I apologized profusely and tried my best to explain, and played with her a great deal to help make it up to her.

The next day I got a call from Murphy. He reported that the cops had stopped looking for us. Thanks to a skilled decker hired by the Fixers, the police evidently discovered that one of the people in the park was a known terrorist. Apparently, Lone Star wants to give Calico Jack the key to the city to thank him for preventing something worse from happening. Murphy also informed me that we were now even, which was a welcome bit of news.

After the furor died down, I went to talk to Scarpy since he’d been asking around at Murphy’s place, and I explained it at least in basic terms. And I made friendly with him. And I’ve kept up playing with the Field spirit, who calls herself Sunflower. It’s actually rather… therapeutic, really, playing with Sunflower. She’s so bright and carefree and everything amuses her. It may sound corny, but playing with the little girl spirit really warms my heart.

You know how I’ve always figured that God won’t throw anything at us that we can’t handle? I’m starting to wonder if I’m right about that.

Over the last couple of months, Lazarus has been busy. He made arrangements for a private security corporation for the team, in addition to helping … Bruce, we’ll say, because it makes me want to smack my head into something solid significantly less than the other option … to arrange for permits and passes and other such legalities for his truck. Antoinette introduced us to a Captain Calico Jack, whom most of the team seemed to get on with reasonably well, and so we took in as a member of the group.

The last day of August, we received word from Iceman that he had a solid lead on one of the movies we’ve been trying to find for The Mogul, Night of the Living Dead. Feeling calm, collected, and finally confident again, I was ready for the mission. Solidly focused. Captain Jack, better at talking to people than myself, made arrangements with the owner of the film for the following night. A hotel manager named Ryan Murdock. We were to meet him next to his green hatchback Toyota Elite at seven in the evening. Being that it sounded relatively straight-forward, we got our things together and headed out.

The drive was uneventful, and in Bruce’s car we travelled to Hotel Liberty, there in Philadelphia. I went to check things out of course, and found a man standing next to a car where he was supposed to be. A little cranial cyberware. Impatient, excited. Nothing unexpected about him, or suggestive of danger. There was a van with a reasonably powerful astral barrier around it, however; suspicious. I went back to tell the others what I’d seen, and we decided Captain Jack would call and inquire about the van and I’d watch his aura during his response. It appeared that Murdock wasn’t attempting to ambush us, and he had security check and apparently the van was legitimate. And so we did the deal. It goes off as expected, and then the doors of the van slammed open.

A couple of grenades I guess flew out of the van, and battle ensued. Nervous excitement and danger started swelling through the astral. Two trolls got out of the van and began attacking. I had Scorch manifest and told him to kill anything coming out of the van, including the trolls. I stand astral security while those in the physical plane battle. Within a few seconds, our side seems to have won, and our enemies flee. We proceed to leave before the police forces show up, and make for the nearest point to mail the package we could find. I continue to play astral security until the package is shipped off.

Bruce’s car rolled slowly to a halt a little way in front of a bug stopped in the middle of the road. A mist had come up. But then in the fog, from near the bus, I could see humanoid figures stumbling toward the car. But only their reflections in the astral. They had no aura. No spirit, no soul, no life. But they were moving around. They weren’t even being animated by magic. They had no mana whatsoever. Perplexed, I wanted to look closer, but Bruce turned the car around to head to a Stuffer Shack and to mail our things there. Captain Jack got out, and more of these… impossible things came out.

At this point I was starting to wonder if I’d lost it. All that work I’d done. All that effort. The blood (loads of it), and sweat, and many tears. Months to cope with what had happened at Madame Ulisha’s. Trying to put it behind me. To adjust to the new reality. Maybe it had been too much.

There are many doors to the mind. Places where the mind can go to cope with things. Sleep is the most common. After a trauma, people tend to sleep, and sleep deeply, while they cope internally with what’s happened. I suppose perhaps as a result of my training from a young age, I went into Intellectualization. I disassociated myself from my emotions entirely, without conscious thought, trying to puzzle out the strangeness before me. The strangeness that shouldn’t be possible, according to every law of magic and physics and anything else I could think of.

While I was pondering this, I manifested to let Captain Jack know what I’d seen. He responded with some smart remark, I think, but I wasn’t really paying attention to him at that point. Bruce hit them with his car, and then took off again, back to the truck stop where we’d placed his rig. And then more of the impossible things showed up.

My mind was racing, trying to come up with an explanation. It wasn’t a magical manipulation. Or a possessing spirit. It wasn’t some psychosis because they were dead. I don’t even think zombie-syndrome could cause your aura to die out. And, trying to figure it out, that’s when I felt something strange around my head, sort of vaguely. Perhaps I was dreaming or something. That would be the only logical option. So I willed myself awake.

There I was, in the dark. I was confined somehow, inside some sort of coffin-like object. There was a blinking red light. And then I felt a sting in the back of my neck. And then I was back with the others. So it was some sort of mental manipulation going on, I concluded, and told the others about it.

Of a sudden, we were in an abandoned storefront, apparently in the middle of nowhere. We had miserable headaches. Our things were there, including the film. I assense the place for any trace of what might’ve happened. I saw curiosity and excitement. An experiment of some sort, perhaps. And then we heard the zombie things approaching again.

Captain Jack announced he knew what was going on, and shot himself in the head before I could do anything. I started to cry out. And we woke up again, in the same abandoned storefront. With all our things. And I should’ve known to try to stop him, but Jack shot himself again, this time in the hand. Blood and bits of bone and tissue sprayed all over the place. And, apparently, horrible pain enough to convince the Captain. No sign of zombies. So it would appear we were indeed genuinely back this time, in reality.

We opened up the film case to check on it, and we found a note from a Chrysis Corporation thanking us for testing their latest SegAtari VR game system, and giving us 500 nuyen each for our participation. Wanting to get out of Philadelphia as soon as possible, we decided to drive back to Chicago to deliver the film, while considering how to make our displeasure as being kidnapped and mentally manipulated best known.

I locked myself in the bathroom for a fair amount of the trip back, once my mind poked its head out of the Door of Intellectualization to see if the coast was clear. I cried a lot. Relief, in part. Anger. Fear. A whole jumble of emotions I didn’t really know how to deal with. I don’t know how much more messing with my head I can take now. Nothing ever seems to make sense lately. It’s like everything I’ve taken for granted as reality keeps shifting. I don’t even know what to say about it. I just feel, somehow, like I know nothing. Maybe it’s His plan to rip away my preconceptions. Or maybe He is just testing me. I wish I knew.

I also began researching a spell to let me awaken people who are unconscious. Just in case.

With the benevolent mercy of the Lord, I’ve had some time to focus on things besides jobs or research. I can’t even remember the last time I took a vacation; at least, a vacation where I was conscious, and not in the hospital. But God doesn’t give to us things which we cannot handle, and with time to process emotions I think I’m feeling significantly better.

After that… mess… I did indeed take a vacation. I went to Milan with Glitter for a week. She had to work for a couple of hours a day, but that wasn’t a big deal, and we did small, lovely things. We slept in and let ourselves wake naturally. I watched the motes of dust in the air shine in pale rays of evening sunlight. We took walks. We visited museums and galleries. We took in shows. Small things. Normal things. Things I’ve dearly missed. It’s amazing how a little time helps us heal. The sudden wracking sobs subsided. The nightmares got… less terrible, at least. I was healing, gradually. Glitter, somehow, didn’t seem to feel I’d lost my marbles. She seemed concerned for me, and a little sad, but she didn’t withdraw from me. God’s kindness in bringing us together never ceases to amaze me.

About a week into my vacation, the Professor called me and we arranged for transport to Portland for a few days later so that I could tell him in person about what had happened. And get checked over by him to make sure I hadn’t really just cracked. He was… surprisingly close-mouthed. He’s never talked a /lot/ granted, but I wish I knew what was going on inside his head. He said he’d get back to me on it.

Feeling much improved emotionally, I asked the Professor for a favor: the path I’ve chosen for the time being is a dangerous one, and I need to learn to defend myself. Truth be told, it was Glitter’s idea more than mine. I’ve confidence in my bindings, but Glitter worries for me, and so I promised her I would work to improve. Besides, I hate getting winded walking up a flight of stairs. I’ve never been physically imposing, but… Well, at any rate, I requested the Professor arrange for physical and combat training, and he obliged me.

I had to return to Chicago, much as the idea made my skin crawl. Like it or not, that’s where the team was, and I needed to be there should Iceman find any information for us on our latest job for The Mogul. But there I spent most of my time in the Tir Embassy. The Professor had arranged for me to train with the Embassy guardians.

How to describe the ensuing training? I worked from sundown until after sun-up each day. Imagine the common image of military training. I ran. A lot. I marched. A lot. With heavy packs. I was made to do pushups until I threw up. I was shot at. I crawled through mud on my belly like a snake. All that sort of thing. But that was only part of it. Tir Embassy guardians are very good at what they do, as befitting their status, and I was to do personal combat training with them, and me a complete novice. The first six weeks or so mostly involved me getting facial bones broken, cuts, slashes, and minor stab-wounds, at least if you don’t count the internal injuries. I spent enough time in the medical ward that I learned some about treating wounds simply through repetition. I also became very, very good at casting healing spells. After about the first six weeks, since the guards were all going very easy on me, I was able to defend myself a little bit.

A sergeant, Lorner, didn’t like me very much I think. A civilian thing maybe, or maybe he was disgusted with how weak I was, or… I don’t know yet. But he introduced me to the Se’lahan, and drilled me in it extensively, in return for helping him improve his laughable grasp of Sperethiel. It wasn’t a really a matter of personal preferences on my part, as I probably would’ve preferred the rapier. But it was what he thought I was most suited toward, and him being the expert, I trusted his judgement. A Se’lahan, of course, is a chain weapon. It consists of a chain about two meters long. At one end of the chain is a wicked, curved blade, finely-wrought and elegant. At the other end of the chain is a straight, short blade. The weapon’s quite versatile, able to slash, pierce, or entangle the enemy. The blades are fine enough to find the chinks in armor for a skilled user, and they’re manipulated by twisting, swinging, and wrapping-around of the chain. And perhaps most usefully, it’s long enough to keep the enemy from easily getting close. On the other hand, it’s miserable to learn. I can’t even tell you how many times I sliced myself open or smacked myself in the face or almost cut off something important.

Perhaps the most surprising thing about all the training was that it was helping me more than physically. My will was focused on the training, but it left my mind free and open to doing other things. Maybe the Professor knew that would be the case when he set it up for me. And it helped my confidence to deal with new situations. That first month I went to bed every day too bone-weary to think or do anything to sleep. And by the time my body started to get used to the training, I’d stopped having the night-terrors, and I was finally feeling in control again.

After about six weeks of training, I was used to it enough that I had energy for other things. So I read, and learned, about anything that would catch my fancy in the Embassy’s library or without. I learned to use the computers a little bit. And in the early mornings I started to research again, working on magics I thought would be useful. For one, I created a spell that would allow members of a team to communicate telepathically; immensely useful if I’m going to spend much of my time in astral space. And learned the basics of a couple of spells by watching the Embassy doctor. And, deciding I was used to it enough that I wouldn’t be too much of a danger to myself, I asked Greg to put in an order with his talismonger friend, for a Se’lahan weapon ranted, but even that would be immensely expensive considering the price of orichalcum.

Previously,Samriel had met with a mysterious Alfred Hitchcockian patron, The Mogul, who wants ten original prints of classic films. He is willing to pay the team 25,000 nuyen apiece after delivery and confirmation of the authenticity of the films. The team set up a decker, Iceman, who is currently scouring the Matrix for any hint of who owns the films.

The team is hanging out in the Swanky Hangar Lair, when Samriel gets a call from Iceman. He’s tracked down the owner of one of the films, George Romero’s 1963 classic ‘Night of the Living Dead’. The owner is a Brian Murdock, manager of the Hotel Liberty in downtown Philadelphia, PA. Captain Jack is given negotiation duties. (SIdenote: Captain Jack was loaned to the team as part of the debt he was working off for the Chicago DeLuca Family.

Captain Jack is a social adept and works out a meet for 1900 the following night. The crew loads up in the Monstrosity and hits the I-80 turnpike, steaming for Philadelphia. 12 hours of driving and four pit stops later, they arrive at the Walt Whitman truck stop. They off load the Fox and pile in, heading to the rendevous site, the underground garage of the Hotel Liberty.

BatDwarf pulls in and parks near the wall, perpindicular to the line of cars. Samriel goes astral as Captain Jack gets out to greet Mr. Murdock who’s standing next to his green Honda Elite. Samriel realizes a nearby Bulldog Security Van has an astral ward on it. He pops back in his body and relays this info. Captain Jack readies his flintlock and heads to the meet. Introductions are made, the Captain is presented with a hardcase. Inside is a 16mm movie reel in preservative film and a certificate of authenticity. He snaps a pic with his pocket secretary and sends it to BatDwarf who forwards it to Iceman. Iceman verifies the certificates realism. Captain Jack produces a credstick and Mr. Murdock slots it, grinning. He offers the team use of two rooms for the night and Captain Jack agrees. They shake hands on a deal well done. Mr. Murdock strolls away to the elevator as…

To absolutely no ones surprise, the rear doors of the Bulldog slam open and two grenades fly out. Captain Jack dives behind Murdocks car as the concussion grenades hit the roof lights off the Fox and bounce off the wall respectively. The tough stolen Ares prototype urban combat vehicle completely takes the blast with no damage at all. Two troll hitters in security armor with chest mounted gyro rigged Ingram Valiant light machineguns clamber out and begin tracking. Captain Jack slides around to the hood of Murdocks car and caps off a headshot at Troll 1, grazing his face. Samriel summons Scorch as BatDwarf launches his Guardian mini Hunter Killer VTOL Drone. Troll 2 seems stunned by the response. Troll 1 fires a long burst down the side of the Elite, splattering gel rounds and ruining the finish.

Captain Jack jumps on the narrow hood of the Bulldog and points his handcannon at the mage inside ordering him to the floor. Troll 2 tries sneaking down his blindside even as Troll 1 gets shredded by the Saburo LMG mounted on the Guardian. Scorch manifests in his demon dog surrounded by hellfire form and breathes at Troll 2, who uses his enhance reflexes to ditch the machinegun and dive away. The Stepvan takes the brunt of the Flamethrower spell, catching fire and ruining Captain Jack’s intent to steal it. The mage is told to RUN and he and the Security Troll leg it out of the garage as Captain Jack piles into the Fox with the movie case.

The team decides to find a 24 hour facility to ship the movie tonight to The Mogul. A curious fog has rolled in while they were in the meeting though and the streets are eeriely deserted. The Fox rolls on and then slams to a stop because a city bus is blocking the street sideways. Several humaniod figures stumble and moan in the fog around it. BatDwarf quickly flips a bitch and heads back the other way, for a Stuffer Shack they passed.

When they reach the Shack, Captain Jack gets out to mail the movie with his blunderbuss in his fist. A trio of obviously very dead people stagger out of the fog near him and he backs up. More and more of the (the PCs had a hard time saying it) zombies appear until Jack’s nerve breaks and he bails back into the Fox. The team is surrounded by nearly a dozen of the things and BatDwarf goes all Carmaggedeon on them, doing donuts and plowing over bodies in an effort to get back to the truckstop.

Back at the Walt Whitman, he sends a command and the ramp lowers, allowing the crew to load the FOX without getting out. They seal up but before they can roll out, Captain Jack announces he knows whats going on and shoots himself in the head.

The team wakes up in an abandoned storefront, with “I should be in a Mexican jail” drug hangovers. They have all of their gear and the film. Captain Jack isn’t sure they are really in the real world so he shoots himself in the hand. Blood sprays from the gunshot wound as he yelps in pain ‘AYE! WE’RE BACK’ He binds the wound up with torn rags as the other two open the film case. Inside they find a note from the Chrysis Corporation thanking the for being test subjects for the latest iteration of the SegAtari VR game system and three credsticks for 500 nuyen. The team vows revenge and loads up for the long, long drive back to Chicago.

Fuck Crysis

Well shit, why do corps keep surprising me, Kidnapped and put in a damn computer game. Though at least they got my blunderbuss right. So some crazy VR that was, ended up shooting myself in the hand because I thought I was still asleep. But if they think they can get away with that drek they’ve got another thing coming.
Chrisis Corp, I’ve got my eyes on you.

Oh you think that’s too short do you? Well fine.
We made a trade, paid some guy for some collector, Got jumped by a couple of trolls and a mage and then we were in the game somehow, fragging zombies everywhere. Was when Sam said the drunken idiots were dead that I realized this shit wasnt real. Anyway we woke up when we realized, in some empty shop front or at least we thought we did, Riggerdwarf told us we were still asleep he seemed pretty certain, so I shot myself. On second thoughts I probably should have shot him. Well whatever I was right.

“The locusts looked like horses prepared for battle. On their heads they wore something like crowns of gold, and their faces resembled human faces.” — Revelation 9:7

From Samriel’s Mental Journal:
03-06-54 (June 3rd, 2054)

Dear Lord, Our Father, please give me strength. This last weekend has been trying in the extreme, and I’ve seen things I thought to never see in my life. Give me the strength to continue, and to not let it weigh me down.

My body can’t seem to decide if it’s tired and wants sleep, or if it’s hyped-up with nervous energy. So when I sleep it’s fitfully and only for a few hours at a time. My anxiety level’s been through the roof, but after my meeting with the Professor hopefully it’ll start to come back down. I need a vacation.

Thursday, May 28th,Eleazar-Lazarus set up a meeting with a Johnson. We met in a Renraku garage with a Daniel Simpson. Obviously he was a good corp man, nervous about dealing with Shadowrunners. Maybe he’d seen too many simsense flicks or something but he clearly didn’t know what he was doing since he let us discover his name so easily.

Anyway, the job sounded relatively easy and straightforward: he gave a necklace to his mistress, his wife found out, and he said he bought the necklace for their anniversary. But the mistress had disappeared with the necklace. Find the girl, get the necklace, and deliver it to Simpson before the anniversary in the next couple of days. It wasn’t paying great, only a few grand, but it didn’t seem too bad for the expected difficulty. It just goes to show you: milk runs aren’t always milk runs.

And so we started tracking her down. Seemed she’d skipped town and given her things over to someone, who had cleared out her apartment. Eleazar got a call from Antoinette DeLuca for a date, and he availed himself of her company, announcing he’d get with us another time. So we proceeded without him. Talking to the landlord and a cat-loving troll fellow, we were able to get a lead to a psychic that the mistress (Victoria Delling) saw on a regular basis for years, a Madame Ulisha. And that’s when things started to go to hell.

We called ahead and set up a meeting with Madame Ulisha, and rather than get straight to it I asked for a reading, curious as to whether she was a legitimate psychic or just a sheister. So, astrally perceiving, I asked her to do her thing. And that’s when I saw what she /really/ was. I about drekked myself, and it was all I could do to keep a straight face and keep up polite conversation with the thing I saw: a massive fragging fly creature the size of a full-grown metahuman.

Able to hold it together for a little while at least, after the reading I inquired about Victoria Delling, and Ulisha said that she had a regular appointment, and was troubled, but hadn’t heard anything from her or knew where she was. Apparently Victoria thought she had a stalker, and a few days ago a Patrick Bramba turned up asking questions, so Ulisha didn’t tell him anything, figuring Bramba to be the stalker. I of course explained that we were hired by a party concerned to find her. Anyway, I was able to keep it together long enough to get out of there without raising too much suspicion, I think.

When we got back to the hangar, I finally let the façade drop. I think that was the longest cry I’ve had in years and years. I cried and showered and burned my gloves where I’d touched some of her things. I felt dirty everywhere and she hadn’t even touched me. A monster that wasn’t supposed to exist was having a conversation with me; an inhuman, terribly alien monster. I probably threw up everything I’d eaten for the last two years before I started feeling better.

And then… then came the worst part: having to explain it to other people. I mean, I’ve heard a few rumors over the years, about spirits that are insects, and bad and terrible things driven by inhuman desires, but I’d always thought it was nonsense. I certainly don’t remember anything in catechism about gigantic insect monsters… although Revelations does reference plagues of giant locust, I believe? Anyway, even /I/ was having trouble believing what I’d seen. Greg didn’t seem as skeptical as I would’ve been, which is good, but when even I was doubting my own sanity… well, it was an enormous relief nobody outright called me a liar. So at least I seem to have earned a certain measure of acceptance from the team as knowing what I’m doing. Which is quite a relief in its own way. I don’t know what I’d have done if they’d called me a liar, except to say that what I saw is what I saw.

Never wanting to see Ulisha again and praying she was the only local monster outside the Shattergraves, we proceeded with the investigation. We tracked down where Patrick Bramba worked when I didn’t get a call back from him, and went to investigate. Entering we spotted a group of oddly happy gangers sitting in a far-too-fancy vehicle watching us as we entered, which got me immediately suspicious. Gangers aren’t usually so fragging happy, and they don’t usually hang out in luxury sedans. Suspecting something was up, we entered cautiously, and I had Batdwarf monitor their movements via his Condor. There wasn’t a trap inside the office, so I projected and conjured up the demons I’m calling Scorch and Tempest, and watched the stairs. Batdwarf set his drone to guard the elevator. While the others searched the office for anything of potential value.

We did find information of value, and it was also a trap. Sure enough the gangers came up the elevator; Batdwarf mowed three of them down with his drone while I had Tempest knock out and capture the remaining ganger for interrogation. By then, Greg andTeagan had finished with the search, and we tied up the ganger and slapped him into wakefulness. I began interrogating him and he claimed to be working for Manny the Melon, a local alderman, sent to kill Bramba for fragging with his business. But after searching them we’d discovered the gangers to have been armed with APDS ammo, which Teagan told us was rare mil-spec stuff. Probably not something an alderman could get, I figured. We didn’t have long to interrogate the ganger before he attacked though. Apparently he came equipped with finger-blades and cut his bonds. Teagan placed a few dozen needles in his skull for his trouble. And so we returned to base.

Things were getting very strange. I called up Big Tony to try to find out how rare this APDS stuff is, and like I suspected, an alderman probably couldn’t get a hold of it. We were missing something. I hired a decker calling himself Surge to help us figure out where Bramba was: find Bramba and we find the girl, we were hoping, and maybe some answers too. We found him in a stripclub named Superdad’s of all things. People never cease to be revolting. Anyway, I sent Teagan and Greg around the back incase Bramba made a run for it that way, while I talked to the barman. As I was afraid of, the barman signaled Bramba that someone was looking for him, and Bramba made to leave. Teagan and Greg were there, fortunately, and it’s right about that time that Batdwarf reported a luxury sedan approaching at high speed. The sedan turned out not to be armored, though; Batdwarf took out everyone in it without difficulty, and Bramba came with us, where we laid everything out for him.

Around this time I also heard back from Surge about further matters. It seemed that Delling’s things had been turned over to the Universal Brotherhood, along with all her assets, legal rights, and so on. So he went looking around the Universal Brotherhood system, and he discovered that she was there, and the necklace was even recorded as being in their inventory, at the North Side Chapterhouse. But for the life of me I couldn’t figure out what the gangers were doing involved in this. Searching for answers, and because it was bothering me, we went back to Madame Ulisha’s, ready to take on the monster if it came down to it.

Damn good thing we were prepared, too. What we found wasn’t Madame Ulisha, but a pair of dual-natured insectoid monsters that reminded me of ants. Ulisha was dead, and apparently she took out a couple of the ant-monsters before going down, but there were still two alive. I sent Cinder and Scorch after them, and they engaged; the ant-monsters were pretty fragging fast, I’ll tell you. They kept up with Cinder and Scorch well. After the rest of the team moved in, the fight didn’t last very long. The ant-creatures were tough, but it’s hard for anything with flesh to last long against a pair of light machineguns and a ninja assassin. I helped too, of course, as did Greg I’m sure.

So we explored Madame Ulisha’s, looking for answers. Some of the answers turned up in the form of a whole box of recruiting pamphlets for the Universal Brotherhood. As near as we could figure, it all seemed to be heading back to the Universal Brotherhood, who might be well-connected enough to get their hands on APDS ammo. And then of course, we discovered the… nursery, I guess you might call it. Inside I found what might loosely be termed a baby, if monsters have babies. Apparently they do. Some sort of half-human half-fly monstrosity that was without a doubt an abomination before God. Something that should never have existed. And a journal talking about how Ulisha apparently thought the same thing; it shouldn’t exist. Presumably for different reasons though, it being hard to control or some such. As near as we could tell from the journal, Ulisha was pregnant when she was possessed by the fly spirit, and so somehow the child became some sort of half-fly half-human monster. Probably never had a soul to begin with. That’s a blessing in a way, I guess. We also discovered proof in the journal that Ulisha had been recruiting people for the Brotherhood.

Realizing of course that nobody would ever believe us if I tried to tell people about this, we collected some evidence. I took recordings of the whole scene. The infantile monster, the journal, the pamphlets, the ant-creatures of which we found four with various sorts of wounds, and of course Madame Ulisha as well although she looked quite human still. Someone might’ve mistaken the ant-creatures for bizarre cyberware I guess, but I’d seen their auras. I knew the truth. So I made sure to take samples for DNA testing, as well as samples from the ant creatures and their mandibles and such so I could show it’s not cyber. If I weren’t going insane, this is a threat to every nation and every people, so after we got back to the base, I put in calls to the Professor and Glitter. Then even if they didn’t believe me, at least if I died, it might lend some credence to my story.

After talking to the team, we decided to bring Surge in as a full member. We’d need serious Matrix overwatch if we were going to raid the Brotherhood chapterhouse. Bramba was all-in on the whole matter, having seen what we saw and wanting to rescue Victoria Delling. I think the poor bastard fell in love with her from afar, or something similarly dumb and romantic. As I was talking to Surge and laying the whole story out to him, he actually left for a minute to answer his fragging door. Then the line went dead. And so, I suspect, did Surge. Somehow, as near as I could figure, the Universal Brotherhood tracked him down and probably sent some monsters to get him.

As much as I wanted to do this… I think we all came to the decision after that that the Universal Brotherhood was a little too large a group for four Shadowrunners and a Private Dick to take on by ourselves. Especially since all their fragging soldiers appeared to be either monsters or armed with APDS ammunition. So we decided to cut our losses. In disguise, I returned the advance we were given, and apologized to Simpson for us being unable to locate the necklace. He didn’t care anymore; he told his wife all about the affair and he went off to join the Brotherhood. Another convert for the monsters.

As I mentioned earlier though, that wasn’t the end of the story. If I’m not going completely insane, this is a matter of security for everyone who doesn’t want to be eaten by monsters in the darkness. So I set up a meeting with the Professor, over a secure line from the Embassy, and I laid everything that I’d discovered out for him. The whole run, all the details, the video, pieces of the samples we’d taken, the links to the Universal Brotherhood’s Northside chapterhouse, the journal referencing another sort of Insect Queen (presumably ant?), everything needed for him to hopefully verify the veracity of my statements. I even offered to undergo a mindprobe if he thought my memories had been somehow altered or something. He said he’d check it all out and get to the bottom of it. I’ve known the Professor since I was a child; he saved me, quite literally. I should be able to rest easier for it now.

Personally I could care less about the money at this point, but for the team and the danger, I went ahead and asked him if there’d be any sort of reward if he’s able to verify the truth of what we discovered. He said we’d see. And for me at least, that’s enough. The Professor would never steer me wrong.

Glitter probably thinks I’m insane. She’s a spirit herself and hasn’t ever heard of insects. A timeless entity who hasn’t ever heard of them… maybe I am insane. I’m so tired after all of this, I don’t even know anymore. I think I need some sleep, and a vacation. Maybe I’ll go back and visit Portland and see the Professor, and spend a week curled up with Glitter, and work on small things like healing some injured poor or writing the thesis that the IOND wanted for my next Initiation to help understand my magical processes more accurately. Not this world-shattering drek. Enough world-shattering drek for the moment. I definitely need a vacation.

Finally, I’m free to start working on things that are actually my forte! I’ve been bored out of my mind with the sitting and the waiting, with nothing better to do than watch trid. I didn’t even have a chip-reader to let me look over my libraries and work on studying. It’s been aggravating in the extreme. Aside from conjuring Watchers and Greg and I putting up some alarm wards, I’ve had almost nothing to keep me occupied since we arrived in Chicago. I wouldn’t be surprised if I was starting to get cabin fever.

Let’s see… back on the 4th we did the job we owed to Antoinette DeLuca. It wasn’t that complex; planning took more time than the entire ‘run actually did. She wanted us to stop or steal a shipment of something valuable coming in for the local Yakuza outfit. It was coming in along the highway in a semi with fairly heavy protection. We spent hours brainstorming, trying to come up with a plan. I suggested a number of ideas: having Grunt roll the escort SUVs, or having Tempest knock out the drivers, or digging a big hole across their path, but once I learned they’d be on major public roads, I ran out of ideas quickly.

It was interesting and unexpected that BatDwarf and Greg, both of whom seem pretty laid-back most of the time as long as money isn’t directly involved, butted heads some. Apparently Greg is a dedicated pacifist, who doesn’t want to kill anyone, even if they’d quite hapilly kill us. And then on the other side of the coin was BatDwarf, who absolutely insisted that we needed to steal the semi that the Yaks were transporting their goods in. I’m not sure why; I guess because he’s a Rigger and they just like having new toys? Anyway, since the best way to actually steal the semi would have been to kill the escorts, BatDwarf and Greg really butted heads and wouldn’t budge an inch. In the end we finally came up with sort of a compromise, at least the best we could manage.

Ultimately the plan we decided on was relatively straightforward. We acquired some satchels of explosives, and we’d drop the explosives on the truck. I’d scout the convoy first to see if they had magical support, to help us determine whether or not we could turn the explosives invisible or to drop them from levitation or if we needed to do it physically. When there was no other traffic around, we would blow the semi’s trailer with its drugs or whatever was inside. This would avoid killing, which made Greg happy. In order to appease the greedy BatDwarf we came up with the compromise that even though we were going to blow up this vehicle, after the run we would use our earnings to purchase another semi that we could use as a mobile base of operations for the team as a whole.

And so that’s what we set out to do. We found the target vehicles, and I proceeded to astrally perceive, but I saw that the vehicle windows were all mirrored. Reporting to the group that I couldn’t tell, and going to have a closer look would be a risk, we decided to proceed with the mundane-methods plan. The explosives were tossed onto the back of the semi’s trailer, and about two seconds later they suddenly exploded. Why they went off so quickly I haven’t the slightest idea, but part of me suspects that maybe the timer or radio detonators that we were given weren’t up to snuff. At any rate, the explosion was gargantuan, and I’m surprised our team on the bridge didn’t get blown up. Bat and I were a long way behind and even inside the vehicle I felt the sheer concussive force in my guts. So in the end I didn’t actually get to do much to contribute, either.

The explosion might’ve been far larger than we’d intended but at least we completed the job. To my surprise, DeLuca wasn’t angry with having caused some collateral damage, or about the fact that it turned out the shipment was shrimp of all things, and not something all that particularly rare or valuable. She even paid us extra for doing it with style.

After the ‘run and getting paid, BatDwarf started researching which semi to buy, and Eleazar started working on getting us some quality fake SINs. I just got mine earlier today, so now maybe I can actually start making some headway in finding a group of like-minded individuals with whom to explore the finer points of the universe’s intricacies. I plan on spending a lot of time out at Little Earth and the Elemental Island, and checking in with Charlotte and Rodney, and Glitter might have some leads as well. I suppose ultimately I need to improve my ability at handling water elementals anyway; they’ve never been my area of expertise. I’ve also got to find a local talismonger and establish good relations, and either rent part of the shop once in a while, or else find myself a reasonable place in which I can perform the conjuring rituals, or I’ll run out of elementals who owe me services before too long.

Laz and Crew: World Renowned Seafood Chefs

Well after an interesting meeting with a capo of the DeLuca family, Antoinette, we were able to move some coke and we got our first run. Antoinette seemed young to hold the position she did, so either she is really dangerous or she has had extensive surgery. In my line of business it is always better to assume the former rather than the latter. If you are cautious, you might not get rich, but you will probably survive another day. And for me that is what it is all about, just surviving. I died once and now twice in order to keep on living, and I will continue to do whatever it takes to survive.

So on to the job offer by Ms. DeLuca. Well it was clear from the outset that this job was going to be different than our standard snatch and grab jobs. We needed to stop a semi full of an unknown cargo from reaching its destination. We really only had two options here, steal the truck and its cargo or destroy it. Bat’s opinion was clear from the go, he wanted the truck. The other big issue we had to deal with was Greg’s unwillingness to remove the yaks acting as escorts. Unfortunately, this created a large dilemma. Because to steal the truck and get away clean, we would have to deal with the yaks and that would likely mean we would need lethal force. This lead to a huge discussion and planning situation. It took the better part of our only day to plan, trying to figure out a way to steal the truck and not kill the Yaks. It wasn’t going well.

I gave it my best diplomatic effort so that we might be able to get on to the real issue at hand, as neither Bat nor Greg was budging an inch. I poured on the old Laz charm, and offered to buy a semi after the run for us to use as a new team mobile platform. I hoped this would placate Bat, and it seemed to work. Now was the issue of how to take the semi out while trying not to kill anyone. Luckily as the shipment was coming in late at night the roads wouldn’t be that busy. Bat finally hatched a plan to attempt to blow up just the trailer and its contents, and we would need to make a quick get away. Big Tony, a specialist in acquiring goods, had been recommended to us by Miss DeLuca. We had him put us in contact with an explosives expert, and we purchased three packs of 10 kilos of explosives. We guessed as to how much we really needed as none of us had experience with demolitions before. We also had Big Tony obtain 2 vehicles for us to use.

Now it was my turn to be really useful, I contacted one of my only reliable contacts, Madame Butterfly. We needed someone to hack the weigh stations so we could get an accurate time frame of the semi’s arrival and we plotted to drop the explosives from an overpass onto the trailer. Seemed simple enough, but you know how that goes if you are in our business. We hoped that Greg could simply lower the packs onto the semi with a levitation spell so that we could get them place properly, however this was only going to be possible if the Yaks didn’t have an astral overwatch going on. If they did it was going to be up to Eva and myself to try and drop them accurately. Erebus and Bat would follow and try to determine if there was an astral overwatch or not. Plan was set, equipment in places, services secured, time to run.

Everyone took up their positions as we got the call from Madame Butterfly. Bat pulled out behind them as they passed him headed our way. Erebus did his thing and came back telling us he couldn’t be certain whether they did or didn’t have astral scouts. This was bad, as it gave us just mere moments to decide whether or not to use magic or not. We decided that while it might be a slight bit less effective, it was less risky if Eva and I tossed the packs. Greg gave us the countdown as the truck approached. It was now or never.

Eva and I dropped our first packs and I quickly grabbed and tossed the third pack. We were going to wait until the semi was clear of any other vehicles then blow it. When the blast hit us, I knew something went wrong for sure. Greg knew the plan, surely he hadn’t hit the button yet, but no matter, I was knocked flat and stunned by the force of the explosion. My vision was blurry as I stumbled trying to get to my feet. Then I felt a firm hand pulling me towards our escape. Thankfully, Eva had avoided the worst effects of the blast and she was saving mine and Greg’s hides. She helped us into the Bulldog and took off. What an introduction to learning how to drive. She did wonderfully though and soon we were back at the warehouse. I have to remember to thank her. She could have just as easily capped Greg and myself and made her escape. But it seems we are truly becoming a solid team.

I vaguely remembered hearing the news reports over that satellite radio. The semi and both escort vehicles had been obliterated. Apparently all the Yaks had been killed or were severely injured. And there was something about crispy fried shrimp. Once my head completely cleared, Eva, Bat and Erebus confirmed what I had heard. At least we were alive and apparently not readily identified. Greg was depressed though as he pouted about the dead Yaks.

The next day we met up with Miss DeLuca at the warehouse, and got our final payment. She was both pleased and amused at the results we had accomplished. She really liked hearing that the oyabun would be without his favorite vice for awhile.

It was decided by the team to use some large sums of the cash to get us the mobile base and get Bat his big rig. I went about the business end of things for the team obtaining our needs. One big one, was new identities for everyone. I took on the name Eleazar, Erebus went with a Sperethiel word, Samriel, that meant discomfort. Boy did we have some fun with that. Eva began using the name Tegan. Only Bat, Greg and Scarlet were still undecided what to go with.

Well things didn’t go off without a hitch, but we can’t really complain, how often do you get to become an infamous seafood chef. Seafood chef you ask, oh I forgot to tell you that the unknown cargo turned out to be a shipment of shrimp, and well the explosion left fried shrimp everywhere. Bon Appetit!

Arriving in the Chicago sprawl, at long last, we found ourselves some cheap motel rooms to bunk while we work on finding a buyer for our ill-gotten gains. The whole business makes me nervous as hell. We’ve got millions of nuyen worth of stuff just waiting for a sufficiently powerful fireteam to come in and blast us all to hell to take it. I’ve got so much nervous energy that for the life of me I don’t know quite to do with it, although I’m trying hard not to emote it. Last thing the team needs is to start thinking that the cerebral types are getting nervous; that’d be hell on morale and things are plenty tense already.

So, the best way to deal with the anxiety is to drive headlong into the work. Lazarus, Scarlet, and I started hitting every Mafia-owned dive-bar, nightclub, and mob hangout we could find. It took us the ten days since we arrived meeting people, buying drinks, sucking up to low-level associates, and running down leads before we could find anyone, but at long last we received a message from a Mafia sotto capo about a meeting. Scarlet used her internet prowess – actually, scratch that, it’s called the matrix now. Anyway, she used her matrix searching prowess to help us find out that the meeting place was an extremely high-class brothel owned by one of the families of mafiosos. We acquired fine outfits so as to blend in with the high-end clientele, hired a limousine for the evening, and headed off to the brothel. And in the meantime? Eva discovered that we had not stolen a million nuyen worth of novacoke – we had in fact stolen some twenty million worth of purified cocaine, and what we had left was worth some 16.2 million or so.

We met with the sotto capo – a woman, to my surprise – and she and Lazarus worked out a bargain. Scarlet complained a good deal about the price, showing both a lack of professionalism and a lack of team unity in front of the Mafia representative. I spent some time checking out the Astral in the club. Nice place, wards around, and I was only slightly surprised to find a pair of air elementals present with us. It’s possible that the elementals were on loan to her by a proper Magician, but more likely the sotto capo is in fact a Hermetic herself. Why she bothers to veil her aura while having a pair of elementals at hand, I truly don’t know. At any rate, after our discussion, we left in the limo that we’d hired to take us to the posh meeting place.

Returning to the group, we were followed, but pursuit broke off once we left the Sprawl proper. After getting dropped off at a nearby motel, we hiked back to the one at which we were staying, and told the others what we’d worked out. Essentially we only struck a bargain for the first five bricks. We would sell them for four-hundred grand, but in exchange we would agree to sell the rest only to her, and furthermore that we would owe her a Shadowrun. And so it’s up to the group to decide how they wish to proceed.

Personally I need something else to concentrate on, so I’m going to go through our rooms and fashion some alarm-wards over our rooms to alert us to any astral presences entering any of our rooms. I’m also going to see what I can do about convincing the Mafia we’re staying at this other motel room. I think what I’ll do is conjure up some watcher-imps, and place several outside the false location, with orders to watch for any astral intruders, and then run into room 7 of that motel and disperse their energies. This will alert me to their demise. I’ll also place a watcher on each cache of the drugs, in case someone were to sleaze their way past my wards, as double insurance. Then at least we should be alerted if they locate us via the astral.

Laz's Death and Rebirth

Life was finally taking a turn for the better or so Laz thought. After burying his previous life, he found himself running the shadows. Not so long ago, he had hired fellows just like him, and now he was one of them. Life has a funny way like that.

He had just finished a pretty successful snatch and grab that had netted some cool creds. Best of all, he got to stick it to the Azzies. Nothing felt better than that, even the fact that it was a very clean run. He loved runs that were quick and clean and with nobody the wiser for what had happened until he and his team were long gone. This had been one of those runs.

Two weeks later he got a call from Eva, one of his team from the previous run, asking for a little assistance in another what seemed to be simple snatch and grab. This one wasn’t going to net a lot of cred, but was more of a personal favor. He agreed to help, largely because Eva and her team had proven so professional the last run.

Things started well, the team came up with a solid plan and had some reasonably good intel on the target. The mages, Erebus and Cindy, were going to use some mojo to get Eva up to the balcony of the apartment and with the aid of some of Bat’s drones they were going to make entry and obtain the objectives and get out quick. An elven hottie named Scarlet and I were going to create a distraction if necessary at the entrance to the building. Scarlet was definitely my type, attractive dark-haired elf with violet eyes, but something about her name just didn’t fit. She was new to me, but the rest of the team vouched for her, so I was fine with that. I mean they had showed the professionalism our last time out so I could give them a little leeway, besides as jobs go this one was going to be easy if everyone just stuck to the plan.

Things started well enough, as Bat got his drones up to the roof just above the balcony and Eva made her ascent. Everything was going according to plan, maybe just a little too well. Should have known something would go wrong. Once Eva and the drone entered the building things began to change rapidly and never for the better. First the house cat suddenly morphed into some giant cheetah, but Bat’s drone and Eva managed that okay. However that was only a harbinger of what was to come. Eva got to the bed and looked under for the bag we needed to recover. But instead of one blue duffel bag, there were two. Oh crap what now, I thought.

Well Eva quickly opened them, the first contained a large number of silver wrapped brick shapes, hell that must be the Vories drug stash, I thought. The second did contain what we were after though. As Eva turned her attention to the safe to get the other items we came for, an argument broke out amongst the team. This is never good, I thought. Scarlet wanted Eva to take the bag of drugs and even worse she wanted Eva to clear out the safe. The safe contained one brick of the drugs and the 10 or so chips as we had been informed. However it also contained an old book, Crime and Punishment, an antique sidearm, a small case, a small black bag and some certified credsticks. I was okay with taking the credsticks in addition to the chips and one brick. But others pushed hard for us to take it all. I knew this meant trouble, but there seemed to be no give in Scarlet or Bat.

So I finally decided to convince them to stick to the items we could likely fence easily. I said leave the novel, pistol and the box which we discovered had an eyeball in it. The bag contained some uncut diamonds, so I agreed we could take them. I wanted badly to leave the drugs behind, but Scarlet and Bat were staunch in their decision. It finally came down to Eva’s decision, as it should have been all along as this was her job after all. Eva caved to the pressure and took the drugs. I didn’t blame her, but I certainly wished she hadn’t. However, if all went well, we would soon be retired and living in the Carribean League or something like that.

Eva and the drone were just getting ready to leave when the Vories pulled up in front of the building. It was time for Scarlet and I to spring into action. I sped my Ferrari 770 Spyder around their car and cut them off. Scarlet, didn’t mis the cue and climbed out, as did I. We erupted into a shouting match. We were both giving it our all, and luckily it was working as it caught the attention of the Vories. In fact one of them walked up and said to me “ Are you going to take that off of her. If I were you I would slap her." Knowing I wouldn’t be able to make that look real, I had to think fast. I mumbled “You can have her!” I wasn’t sure if he heard me or not, but I had to follow through now. So I jumped into the car and took off down the street. This shocked Scarlet, the sheer sincerity in that look was sure to convince the Vories of our authenticity. Scarlet didn’t let this distract her long. Sensing what I was up to she gave chase. Around the block I pulled over and waited for her to catch up. As she climbed in the car, Scarlet slapped me in the face, but I had expected that. All that mattered at this moment was had we done enough.

It had worked, the distraction had given Eva and Bat just enough time to clear out. We were driving like bats out of the NAN as we decided to head for a safe house on Council Island and plan our next move. Things quickly went down hill from there. We tried to contact the joygirl to set up a meet, but she had already been taken. This was not good and we knew it. That was when I finally got to see Scarlet’s true face and finally I understood why she was called Scarlet. It seems she wasn’t an elf at all, but in fact a human with long flowing red hair. While not in the least unattractive, it definitely stunted my interest in her. That was likely a good thing, considering the drek we were in now. It was all over the newsnets. The Vories were tearing the Red Light District apart looking for us. The had hit our usual meeting place, The Shamrock, and our fixer, a guy I knew only as Murphy was on the run. Drek just kept going from bad to worse, slot it. Murphy informed us that the Vories had a 500k reward on our heads. With that kind of money looking for us, two things became abundantly clear. One, we had severely underestimated the value of what we had taken and two, we had to get the frag out of here.

Everybody got what stuff they could recover, which left me in an awkward position. Because my Ferrari would be so noticeable, I had to ditch my prized vehicle and I was going to have to leave behind my greatest assets, all my wonderful contacts that I had made since my rebirth. It was going to be painful, but I am guessing it was for just about everyone else as well. Bat came through on getting us a ride out of the Sprawl, and I negotiated us a price that was more to our taste, but still this wasn’t going to be cheap. A T-Bird pilot, whose name I will leave in the analogs of anonymity, was able to get us across the border and into the NAN lands. It was a rather rough ride that left us all the worse for wear. Finally we stopped at a tourist trap/truck stop and we all climbed out and headed in to get cleaned up. We bought some new clothes and it was at this time I came to see just how attractive Eva really was. You see I don’t normally go for the human girls as they are rarely good enough looking for my tastes, but when I saw Eva walk out of the truck stop in the little buckskin outfit, my jaw nearly hit the floor. What could I say, she was really gorgeous. I intended to remain professional, though I new it wasn’t going to be easy.

A little while later we were hooked up with an old NAN runner who agreed to take us the rest of the way. Things were going okay and Bat was having fun blasting things from the sky while we drove like crazy. Then the old guy’s truck bit the dust and he had to call in help. It was cold as hell and I huddled with Scarlet and Eva for bodyheat. This may have been a mistake, as I could feel the heat building between Eva and I. Next thing you know, a group of ork gangers showed up. Slot it, I thought, we will have to fight for our survival. However turns out, this was the help the old guy had summoned. After some discussion between the ork gang leader and the old guy, they agreed to take us the rest of the way and we hopped on the back of their bikes and we were off. It was a rough ride for some of us who weren’t use to this kind of thing, but finally as night fell, the gang stopped at an old abandoned motel.

They started up a fire, and the boozing began. I took a couple of swigs in order to not insult our hosts, but I knew any more than that and I wouldn’t maintain my faculties. The others appeared to be doing the same. Then the ork leader approached me and challenged me to some kind of duel for the honor of Eva. While I was fairly certain, Eva didn’t need anyone to defend her honor, I also sensed that to turn this down would have been bad for us, so I reluctantly agreed. It was a strange ritual that the leader described, I needed some article of Eva’s clothing to tuck into my belt and then our arms were to be tied together and we would be armed only with knives. Then we would fight, the winner was the one to draw first blood, but it would be even more disgraceful if I lost Eva’s clothing, in this case her socks. I just truly hoped I didn’t die, but as the contest began I slipped back to my old days in college when I was a member of the fencing team. Some of those tactics were bound to be useful here I thought. The ork leader, though, was exceptionally skilled and quickly had both socks and I was in trouble it seemed. But I reached deep, and made a quick low slash after a high feint and managed to recover both socks in one fell swoop, then as he came in for the kill, I countered with quick slash down his forearm. Just like that the fight was over and somehow I was victorious.

The ork leader was impressed and told me his name was Bloodhawk. A strong name for a strong leader I thought and then I went to return Eva’s socks. She was quite wasted or stoned at this point, though I wasn’t sure which. Didn’t really matter, what did matter was she was coming on strong and despite my better judgment I surrendered to her beauty and we went into the motel. After a blissful night in her arms, I couldn’t let her know I had been sober for the whole thing, so I hid the evidence of what we had done. It wasn’t much use though, she knew anyway. I was certain now though I could pull it together and keep things professional, boy was I wrong.

After spending another long day on the back of these bikes, I was exhausted when we stopped and getting a little saddle sore. But tonight’s entertainment, was to be some crazy bike jousting. You know like those knights of old that rode their horse at each others and slammed long wooden poles together, except now bikes replaced the horses. Well, I knew I was in for it as Bloodhawk approached me. Seemed I was to take part, damn the crazy things I was doing just to keep these orks from ganking us. While we were talking, an incident happened and the bag of coke dumped onto the ground. After an awkward silence, Bloodhawk and I agreed to terms of 1 brick, oh and I still had to do the joust. Well this was going to be bad. I, once again just hoped to come out alive. I got atop the bike and they strapped a piece of metal to my chest. I prayed to any gods that might be out there though I wasn’t really a believer. And then it was on. It was truly a blur as I recall few of the details, but I managed to land a blow and keep the bike upright. Frag, I even managed to pull off a fancy move to stop the bike. Once again I had impressed the gangers, and knew now that we would make it to Chicago.

After the joust, I approached the fire where Eva was smoking some weird pipe. She challenged me to a smoke off, and though I knew it was a stupid idea considering the previous night, I simply couldn’t say no to her. I don’t remember much after that first hit, but I have a feeling I did some things that I would regret if I knew what they were, but one thing I did not regret was waking up next to Eva. The only memories that remained from the previous night were of having blissful sex with this beautiful woman. It was going to be really hard to remain professional with her, but if we could keep it to just sex and no emotional attachments I figure things will be okay. But damn this woman is one of the finest lovers I have ever had, and well there have been many in my life.

Finally the next day we arrived at the outskirts of Chicago. Here is to hoping this is the last time I have to die and begin anew. Having been though this before, I knew what we would be up against and hoped the others would be up to the task of starting over. Life has it funny ways and I have once again managed TO DIEANOTHERDAY.

Or: My Speedy Move to Chicago

Well… drek. Honestly, what can I say about the last few days? It has been insane. After the last Run went off so perfectly, this one has been more slotted than a joygirl with a BTL habit.

It started off on the 17th around 1700. The group of us from the last Run, plus Scarlet, met up at the Shamrock to talk about this job that Eva got from a local joygirl. It sounded pretty straightforward: the joygirl needed her bag of clothes and things from the place of a Vory thug that she didn’t want to see again, mostly because it had some things of sentimental value in there. She couldn’t pay much but knew the combination to a safe that had a brick of novacoke in it. It all sounded simple and straightforward. Don’t all the worst ones sound like that at first though, in the end?

After initial investigation and surveillance, and the joygirl’s intel, we determined that the Vory thugs liked to leave to head out to clubs and party around 2100 and return around 0000 most nights. We knew they were on the top penthouse level of a very nice building, with security by Knight-Errant. So we came up with a relatively simple plan: Invisibly levitate Eva and a drone up to the balcony, cut a hole in the window, enter, take the things from the safe, get the joygirl’s bag, and then levitate Eva and the bag of ill-gotten gains back down the same way they entered. If the Vories came back, Scarlet and Lazarus would run interference by staging a lover’s spat in front of the building.

When I went for an astral scan of the place, I quickly noticed Knight-Errant had set up a couple of watcher spirits around the building to watch for astral intruders. On top of that, the building was covered in ivy to prevent entry, although strangely the roof was clear. Unwilling to risk altering the watchers, I returned to the group and told them what I’d found. After some consideration, we continued with the plan.

The plan itself went off well. We got Eva up to the balcony invisible, a hole was cut in the balcony door/window, and she and the drone entered. They quickly encountered a cheetah – how they encountered a cheetah in an apartment, I have no idea, I couldn’t see it – but were able to knock it out without too much trouble. Things were going excellently, until we found a bag of diamonds, some 41 bricks of novacoke, certified credsticks, a preserved human eyeball, ten chips, an extremely old pistol in perfect condition, and an original first edition of a classical Russian novel. (OOCly I totally forget which novel).

Eva seemed inclined to only take one or two bricks of the novacoke and maybe the chips, and of course the bag of the joygirl’s things. I was glad that she’d learned from Lazarus’s wisdom in the last run. This didn’t please Scarlet though who proceeded to hound Eva over the comsys, or BatDwarf who seemed interested in taking all the loot as well. Lazarus was able to talk them into at least only taking the things that would be reasonably movable; we’d never be able to sell the collector’s items. In the end though we took more than we’d have imagined was there, and I suppose in part I’m at fault for not trying to stop them more. Foolishly, I’d assumed everyone in the group were already consummate professionals; perhaps that estimation was incorrect.

After I removed my auric traces from the scene of the crime, we took off, to a rather interesting rental safehouse place on Council Island. I was greatly impressed by the quality and cleverness of the wards that were set up. There we started figuring out what to do. Once we found out that the joygirl who had hired us had been kidnapped and was being tortured by the Vories, however, and so we quickly came to the conclusion that we needed to get out of Seattle, quickly. Frustratingly, a few of the friends I’d made since coming to Seattle – well, Hannah Minx and Mustang Sally at least – would probably have taken the 500k reward on my head had they connected that it was me, so unfortunately I probably won’t get to talk to them anymore. I feel even worse for Lazarus, since he didn’t lose much in the way of physical goods but had spent an incredible amount of time meeting people, without having been close enough to any that he could trust them in this situation.

I was able to get Glitter to grab some essentials from the farmhouse and bring them to me near the safehouse on Council Island. I had to explain about how the run went bad because some of the other people got greedy, and I need to lay low elsewhere for a while until the Vories calm down and get back to business. Hopefully it won’t be too long before I can come back to Seattle, as I really liked my farm a good deal. I was able to talk Sofia Leadbetter into feeding Noir while I’m away, though I’ll need to call Hue and Farshorn soon and let them know I’m away on biz and it’ll probably be a while before I’m able to return.

At any rate, we arranged for a T-bird pilot to meet with us. Lazarus was able to negotiate him down to “only” five bricks of Novacoke to get us on our way. After buying some touristey crap at a truckstop so that we could wash all the vomit off of ourselves after the crazy ride, things started going a little better. The T-bird pilot gave us his contact information and set us up with a new pilot for the next stage of the journey. Things were going pretty well with the old Amerindian vet, until his vehicle broke down in the middle of the mountains during the snow. Fortunately, he was able to find a go-gang of orks who were headed to Chicago and would let us ride with them. I don’t know what the old Amerindian rigger and the orks worked out, but the next two days were certainly interesting.

The first night after we stopped, I was rather sore, but had expected worse. The orks stopped at a disused motel and set up a bonfire in the parking lot of all things. I had some sort of moonshine that burned my throat, and I think I spent most of the rest of the evening in some sort of stupor because surprisingly, despite my usually perfect memory, I don’t remember that much. I seem to recall conjuring up a fire demon I decided to call Cinder. And I remember having a great conversation with it, which surprised me. And we had some steaks that Cinder cooked. And I remember something about Lazarus with tribal war-paint on him. That’s about it. I woke up the next morning hung over, but we continued.

While riding the next day I mostly concentrated on holding on and not vomiting, until again we stopped for the evening. We had an awkward moment when some of the bricks of novacoke fell out of the saddlebags; apparently the old rigger hadn’t told them what we were transporting. We decided to share a brick of the stuff with the orks, and they really seemed to take a shine to us after that. I decided to partake of their Deepweed, figuring it would have no real ill effects, but I think I must’ve had some moonshine and other things too, because I honestly still don’t remember much, and what I do seems like it must’ve been a hallucination. I remember something about a gigantic purple platypus and its little children dancing around most of the night, and I seem to recall them flying around too. I remember some automatic gunfire pretty clearly, because I had to hide behind Cinder for protection. I remember going to bed with some beautiful women for a while. Oh! And then I had some great conversations with a guy I later learned was named Rodney and then something about Superman. I also seem to recall a bunch of big guns and a dwarf spewing everywhere. And I must’ve had some kind of dream about jousting medieval knight style.

By the time morning rolled around, I was still somewhat hung-over, but it wasn’t too bad. I got to have a more proper conversation with Brainiac, otherwise known as Rodney, one of the ork go-gangers. Turns out he was a goblinized ork that was a most excellent thaumaturgical student following the Hermetic path. We went through Nebraska but honestly I hardly remember of it, I was so wrapped up in the talk with Rodney the whole time. I think we’ll become good friends. This whole thing might’ve been a massive headache and extremely stressful, but I guess meeting a good guy like Rodney is a silver lining. I’ve never known an ork as intelligent and well-educated, and the more impressive bit is that he taught a lot of the more advanced theory to himself. When I get back into research, I will absolutely offer him a job in my lab, he impressed me so much.

At any rate, late this afternoon we’ve finally arrived in Chicago, our destination. Hopefully we’ll not have too much trouble selling our ill-gotten gains, as we need to set up new lives for ourselves. My carefully chosen moniker is also going to have to go the way of the dodo, and I’ve no idea what I should pick for a new one.

The way all Shadowruns SHOULD go

It seems that my good faith in Murphy has been rewarded; Charlotte did not steer me wrong. Tonight our job went off rather splendidly, I felt. The danger level was high, but the rewards were far better than the first job and things went well. I wish all Runs went so well.
I received a call from Murphy a few hours after I’d finally passed out with Glitter, offering work. Reluctantly, I pulled myself from the nice warm bed and got showered and dressed. Arriving at the Shamrock, I was able to finally meet Murphy in person. A good sort of fellow I felt – if a little brusque – despite being from NanOg. He introduced the group of us – Greg, Eva, BatDwarf, and I – to an experienced Runner going by the moniker of Lazarus Pariah. He dressed well and had a professional look to him, and a calm, experienced, authoritative manner, so I was quite pleased.

After basic introductions concluded, Murphy told us that he had a Johnson wishing to meet with us at the Eye of the Needle. He was even able to get some halfway decent clothing for the people dressed poorly. Taking two vehicles, we entered the Eye of the Needle, BatDwarf staying in his vehicle for some reason I wasn’t entirely clear on. Riggers like to stick close to their vehicles, I suppose. After Lazarus and I had a nice meal – Eva and Greg abstained, and honestly I only partook because Lazarus seemed confident that he could have the meal included in the contract – the Johnson finally showed. Scruffier-looking than most Johnsons, he at least seemed polite, and he explained the job: to break into an AzTechnology research facility to take a biological sample and the research data from the computer system. He even had a way for us to get in: past some brickwork was some plasteel that he had an agent for that could cause it to weaken so we could work our way inside.

Being that we were breaking into an AzTechnology location, I decided to actually participate some physically, figuring that there would be substantial warding around the area we needed to get to. After the meeting we went to a van outside the entry point to gather some equipment the Johnson had provided, and from there we went on a trek through the sewers. The Johnson had given us a map of the sewers in that area, and it was relatively accurate for a change. Not great, but mostly accurate at least. Along the way we encountered a couple of passed-out dwarves, and we came across a group of bats that I was pretty shocked attacked us. Made me kick myself that I hadn’t used my Calm Pack spell to make them docile before we approached, I’d just never heard of bats attacking metahumans before.

Anyway, we finally arrived at our destination in the sewers, and I called up Slate the Rock Demon and had him break through all the brickwork. While the rest of the team waited for the catalyst to start working, I made preparations for astral travel. Attaching my biomonitor and linking it to my commsys. Then calling up a pair of Watcher imps to act as messengers and my strongest bound demon, I departed my body. Somewhat to my chagrin, I didn’t find any wards, but what I did find were two powerful Fire Elementals. Immediately after entering the facility, they noticed and rushed forward, and so combat ensued!

One of the fire elementals was faster than me, and before I could call forth the energies to defend myself, it struck me a solid blow. Meanwhile, one of the Imps rushed back to the group to let them know I had encountered resistance. I set Scorch on one of the Elementals while I began working to disrupt the other Elemental’s connection to the physical plane in an attempt to banish it. I was doing quite well, but Scorch was finding that direct combat wasn’t much his forte, and took several hits. After I managed to get the Elemental who had attacked me down to a low level of strength, I switched with Scorch and sent him after the newly-Force-One Elemental while I engaged the one Scorch had been having trouble with. Soon enough both of the guardian spirits had been defeated, both myself and Scorch rather worse for the wear. Returning to my body, I was able to get Greg/Cyndi to heal my physical injuries and explained to the group that we needed to be fast in case someone came to investigate the defeated elementals, and we made our way through the disrupted plasteel into the ventilation ducts of the facility.

BatDwarf sent his drone forward along the ducts to examine one end, and reported two grates, including one that had been pushed inward into the ducts, meaning we might’ve had something in the ducts with us. Steeling myself, I once again projected my consciousness, and examined the rest of the ducts and thankfully found them clear. But as I began to examine the facility, it became immediately obvious that something was extremely wrong with the place. There was something markedly wrong with the auras of the people I found, though I wasn’t sure what. These people were either insane and terrified, or hungry and full of rage. The background count was alarmingly high, and there were signs of death all over the place. As if that weren’t strange enough, when exploring the area I even found things that looked like some sort of millipede, except that they were the size of cats!

Returning to my body, I reported what I’d found to warn the team. It was eventually decided that Greg would utilize his Influence spell to cause one of the creatures to sleep, and a drone and Eva would sneak across the room to get into the biohazard vault where our paydata was, while Laz and one of the drones would provide cover-fire if necessary. It went flawlessly, and Eva enormously impressed me that she was able to get past those people without a problem, and Lazarus showed he wasn’t above getting his hands dirty when necessary too.

We exited via the sewers the way we’d come in. I’d never bothered taking off my chem suit, so didn’t have to get dressed again. We made good our escape, went to the boat and delivered the goods, got paid, and left. There was some talk about trying to find extra things to steal, but Lazarus was able to talk everyone into just taking what we need, to improve our professional status. It went beautifully, and ALL Runs should go so well. I’m very impressed with the level of professionalism in the group and think Lazarus will be an excellent addition to the group.

On the down side for the others, from what I gather, they got some skin infections due to wandering around the sewers in knee-deep “water.” Not surprising, really. And they thought I looked ridiculous in the full-on chem suit! Remember, kiddies: don’t play around in human excrement.

Or: Crazy Party Battle!

I was woken up in the early afternoon. Much to surprise it was Charlotte, my fixer and a consumate professional in her business of getting other people the things they need. She was short, polite, and professional as always. She said she had a lead on some business and I should go down to a place called the Shamrock and speak to a former Tir Nan Og elf named Murphy about some business. I verified with Charlotte that this Murphy was vetted and professional, and she went on to explain that he had a good reputation and specialized in helping bring teams together. And so after getting ready, I left for the Shamrock.

Arriving in the parking lot and looking around, I saw the place was rather lower-class, and so I called up Scorch (well, that’s what I’m calling him in polite company) from his plane incase I should need him. Entering the bar, I ordered a Guiness from the smart-assed bartender on duty and inquired after Murphy. Being told he wasn’t there at the moment I resolved to wait and enjoy my beer.

Eventually I received a phonecall from Murphy who explained that I needed to speak to a woman named Scarlet, and so after inquiring of the bartender, he went off to see about getting her. While waiting I struck up a conversation with a man I’d have sworn was homeless. Scruffy and unkempt-looking with a full beard, he seemed nice enough, even if I did wonder if he mightn’t be some sort of hippy. Partway through the conversation he received a phonecall himself, and it seemed Murphy was instructing this fellow (who identified himself as Greg) to also meet with Scarlet about business. A pleasant surprise.

A few moments into our conversation, Scarlet came out and brought us into the back room to fill us in. From the sounds of it there were two simultaneous and linked jobs desired: escort some women to a particular location and rob that location. (OOC: I know that’s not what it was, but that was the best I could figure when people were telling me in-character). We split into two groups, with myself and a dwarf and Scarlet planning the breakin. We began to discuss the details and the Johnson, whom I’m relatively sure was a prostitute of some sort, began helping us figure things out. Scarlet excused herself for a few minutes, I presume to go to the restroom, while we talked.

Of a sudden I heard two silenced gunshots. Not wishing to accidently burn down the bar for a false alarm, I wove concealing weaves of mana about myself and hid beneath the sturdy table. Interestingly there was a gun and several clips of ammunition beneath the table. I stayed there for some time, wondering what was going on. I heard angry voices for quite some time, so I stayed put.

Once the immediate fighting seemed to be over with, I cautiously approached the dwarf at the doorway (dressed for some reason so incognito he couldn’t help but be conspicuous) and whispered, still invisible, asking what happened. He asked me to drop the spell, but not knowing the situation I wasn’t about to do that. After a few moments he went back into the little hallway and I leaned over.

A man I’d seen in the other meeting room was floating pressed against the ceiling, and Scarlet was laying on the ground conscious and angry-sounding but her mouth was covered in blood she must’ve spit up. As near as I could tell, the man on the ceiling was a plant for AzTechnology working for them, and he and Scarlet got into a fight over the man wanting Scarlet’s help to kidnap a little girl for AzTechnology. Some men with almost no remaining life-energy arrived after a while and took the man who was on the ceiling away.

Still not being clear on what happened or why, and more than a little worried, I messaged Murphy to let him know that the Runners had been trying to apparently kill each other. I was concerned about their professionalism and if I really wanted to run with such a volatile group. Murphy was slightly disappointed nobody died, of all things, but he assured me that the group is generally pretty good and professional. I decided I’d give Murphy the benefit of the doubt, but I’m not sure whether the group is particularly suited toward how I prefer to do things.

After some of the chaos, a woman, the afforementioned dwarf, Greg, and I decided we might as well try getting the escorting mission done with. After I went to park my SUV in a nearby garage and get the medkit and biomonitor, I explained to the dwarf, a Rigger, about my usual setup: I’d project and perform astral overwatch, and command my elementals if there is need. If I am harmed, the biomonitor registers it and will alert the rest of the team via comms-channel. If I go unconscious, I instructed the rigger to follow the directions of the Medkit to help me, and if that didn’t bring me back to consciousness to use my pocket secretary to call Farshorn. In this way I could minimize chances of dying if something went badly, and it would alert the team if I encountered any major problems. In the future I’ll also use watcher spirits as messengers, I believe.

We arrived at a seedy strip club. It was not pleasant. The women were not very attractive. And revoltingly, the Johnson, a Larry the Lizard, wanted us to escort two women pretending to be elves, with cheap paste-on ears, to their destination. Ultimately the best deal I was able to arrange for the team was 1400 nuyen total and tickets to something called a watermelon show.

Around this time I noticed that Greg, whom I’m guessing is an illusion-focused magician, and who had for some reason wove a web of mana to cause himself to appear as an attractive female, was getting hit on by a rather insistent male troll. Leaving Greg to his own devices – after all, who am I to judge? – I helped escort the poseur prostitutes to the vehicle. It was then that I noticed that one of their ears was off, which began to irritate me more than I probably should’ve let it. But really, if you’re going to pretend to be an Elf, you should at least try to do it competently. Very irritating. Greg finally hopped into the vehicle after saying something to get the troll to leave him alone, and we proceeded onward.

The arrival went off without significant issue. No problems on the drive over, and at the location in question the guards quickly verified things and we dropped off the prostitutes. One of the prostitutes complimented me repeatedly on my appearance, which I guess was her attempt to be nice. I suppose a prostitute would put a fair stock in a person’s appearance as important. At any rate, she gave me a piece of paper indicating she wished to leave the prostitution life and Larry the Lizard and to call her. I agreed. I might or might not do it. I suppose it’s possible Larry made her put on those God-awful ears and it wasn’t her own choice and maybe she’s not a bad person. Maybe. Anyway it sounded like Scarlet might be interested in the job. Though for the life of me I don’t see what would be so hard about leaving. All you’d have to do is move elsewhere when he wasn’t expecting it.

At any rate, the drop-off went off fine, and we split the money amongst the group. On the way back, for some reason Greg picked up his phone and started speaking into it, but as near as I could tell there wasn’t anyone on the other end. He talked about babysitting, of all things. After returning to the Shamrock we went our own ways. Hopefully the group becomes a little better; the first half of the evening went badly, but the little escort job we did went fine at least. I’ll have faith that Charlotte knows what she’s doing and this Murphy hasn’t set me up with a bad group.

AKA David fell asleep

April 2, 2064
1200: A buzzing alarm wakes Bruce up from a cold rock floor. He is confused and thristy. He glances around a large cavern with several vehicles and drones in it as well as a huge plasma screen computer built into one wall. ‘Good afternoon, Master Bruce, I am Alfred, your digital butler. If you head up those stairs, you will find clothing and food in the main house.’
Bruce does so and finds only his clothes, a cellphone, a personal credstick and a ring of six passkeys.
1200: Scarlet gets a call from Murphy asking her around to the Rock later for biz. She heads out to buy supplies and fix her disguise for the evening.
1300: Palmsey calls Murphy and is told to cone to the bar if he wants to talk. He takes a can there and is met with suspicion. He is led into the war room and Murphy pulls his .45 out and lays it on the table. ’Talk’he says. Palmsey verifies his identity and Murphy grudgingly agrees to give him a second chance. They both head back to the bar.
1400: Eva gets a call from Flex telling her if she wants in on a job, head to the Shamrock by 1800. She gets ready
1430: Cindy is watching bad trid when Murphy calls with work. He agrees to meet there.
1600: Following Alfred’s directions, Bruce has assembled his gear. He has been told if he does good work, more will be revealed. He climbs into his GM Fox armored off road SUV and drives up a ramp. Outside, hydraulics slide a section of rock wall and hedges aside and the Fox emerges onto a state road.
1615: Eva leaves her doss and heads for the Shamrock.
1618: Cindy leaves his apartment as well but gets too close to Eva, who darts into an alley and disappears
1700: K-Fin the resident pool shark takes 180 yen off Palmsey then asks if he’d be down for a deal. The pair head out and Kyle pops his trunk. He comes up with two vials and two autohypos,selling two hits of Jazz and Kamikaze to Palmsey.
1705: Eva is coming round the corner and spots two dudes badly hiding their drug deal. She wanders upand Palmsey places a hand near his gun. Eva ignores him and talks to Kyle. They head back inside.
1710: Cindy arrives and heads in. He buys a beer and then Rena sidles up next to him. He buys her a NOg soykaf and gets her number in case he’d like her other services after viz is done.
1715: After losing a beer to K Fin, Eva has his number and has taken the first step towards her goal of being Queen Novacoke.
1730: Scarlet in disguise arrives.
1735: Bruce arrives and Murphy wrangles them into the war room.

or the GM pays the PCs back in spades

March 25, 2064
1100: Murphy calls the team and tells all of them they are burnt and to GTFO as soon as they can. Also, forget his number
1105: King calls Grinder and gives him the address of his Redmond bolt hole, telling the samurai he can crash there. He then climbs on his bike and races there to wait in ambush, hoping to collect the 20k bounty on Grinder’s head.
1110: Lisa is dyeing and cutting her hair in order to try and make a getaway from the Seattle Hilton.
1110: Meow is shaving himself bald and calls Lisa to come get him in her new car so they can run for it together
1110: Grinder calls Angryjack for a ride and is told to be outside in 20 minutes. He packs his stuff and waits.
1110: Scarlet adjusts her SmartShades and crouches in the hallway outside Grinder’s apartment in front of the exit stairs.
1130: Grinder leaves his apartment as Lisa leaves hers on the other side of town. She passes an elven dude named Ryan, who unbeknownst to her used to run with Scarlet. He rings up Scarlet and let’s her know Lisa’s headed out.
1131: A pair of silenced 11mm bullets rip off Grinder’s right cyberear and crease his cheek as his wired reflexes send him crashing through the nearest door. He tears across the room as the Sammy who lives there goes for his gun and smashes through the window onto the fire escape.
1133: Grinder half stumbles half falls down the fire escape and makes the alley just as Scarlet exits the shattered window above and double taps him in the back, punching a hole in his armor and breaking two of his ribs and hitting the DNI controller for his cyber arms.
1134: Grinder flees wildly around to the front of the building in agony, blood soaking his back and coating his face. Suddenly he catches a glimpse of a barrel on a nearby roof and throws himself forward as the plate glass window shatters behind him. He scrambles to AngryJacks cab and says Go!
1135: Angryjack rolls 100m before a voice on the radio tells him to stop. Apparently, Judah and Grimjack of the runner group Six Pack want to chat with Grinder about stealing their van. AngryJack tells Grinder it’s 5000 or he gets out. Grinder gives him 4800 nuyen and one of his Smartguns. Angryjack pops thermal smoke and roars backwards as an AVM blows a crater out of the street. He roars off toward the Barrens.
1145: Lisa sees a large column of smoke on Lyman Avenue and takes the shortcut over to Roswell, headed for Meow’s place there. Scarlet had radioed her sniper buddy on the roof to look out for a new Americar so Lisa is shocked when her windshield shatters and a round punches her in the chest, knocking her sideways and sending her car slowly rolling up the sidewalk.
1148: Grinder gets a call on his cell, but his malfunctioning arms cause it to drop on the floor. He picks it up, finally, and hears Lisa weakly calling for help. He convinces AngryJack to drive back into the RLD by giving up his Predator, sword, and survival knife.
1150: Lisa plays dead in the front seat of her car waiting for Grinder
1200: AngryJack pulls alongside the Americar and Lisa bolts out, a bullet blowing a chunk out of the bench seat. Suddenly, a figure speeds out of a nearby alley, leaps and lands on the roof. A fist-sized hole appears in the ceiling and a female voice with a slight Texas accent says ‘The gal can leave, but Grinder stays.’ Lisa takes the offer and hobbles away, bleeding everywhere. Grinder shoves a concussion grenade through the hole, but Scarlet backflips off the car as AngryJack speeds away. Scarlet sprints to her Americar and gives chase.
1220: Scarlet follows the cab and makes a call. “That’s good right here, Jack”. The cab begins to slow as Grinder realizes he’s been set up six ways to Sunday. He shoves a belt of four concussion grenades through the pay slot in Jack’s seat which detonate stunning the Angry Samurai at …70mph. The cab slides right and launches airborne, crashing down an embankment and hitting a wall. Jack is seriously hurt but Grinder is dead, his neck and skull crushed on impact.
1225: Scarlet pulls up and calls DocWagon for Jack. She unlocks the back and cuts Grinder’s cyberarms off and one eye. She then calls Bubba and has Jack’s cab towed and the body disposed of to the ghouls of Tamanous. So long, Grinder.
1230: Lisa stumbles into a Soybucks coffeeshop and makes it to the restroom. She cleans up and calls Murphy. He’s pissed that she called him but calms down when she asks if he can get in touch with Aurora. He does so and they send a team to fetch her. She is stripped of weapons and drugged.
1300: Alex is at his bolt hole, making a polymemetic mask for himself and hiding his bike. Unknown to him, Scarlet is on his trail having had Quint the decker ping the last known cell tower he called from. Alex calls for a cab and arranges to meet it at the Welcome to Redmond sign. As he heads that way, he sees a ramshackle shed with a bunch of suits in it and an ork with a shotgun sitting on top of it. He buys a cheap, dirty suit for 50 nuyen and heads to wait under the bridge.
1330: A Mitsubishi Nightsky limosine rolls up and stops. A voice calls out ‘Mr. Kingston, come out and join us.’ He does so and it’s the Johnson from the Aurora Run. Alex gets in the limo and is given the truth. Aztechnology hired them for the Aurora run and since he was so kind to provide blood samples, it was a simple matter to track the entire team with watcher spirits and following cars this whole time. Mr. Lopez offers Alex a deal, a new face and new identity but Aztechnology owns his ass. He is given a cellphone that he must keep on at all times and taken to a clinic for reconstructive facial surgery (and cortex bomb implantation). He is renamed Palm Almisey and set loose after a few days. He lost his vehicle because he left it parked in his bolthole and some gangers had a party there, his contacts because they think he’s dead and his former reputation because everyone thinks his entire team was iced. He’ll have to start over.
1600: Roswell Apt C, The door is blown off its hinges and two frag grenades are tossed in as the rear window explodes from medium machinegun fire. Meow puts up a fight as best he can but eventually is riddled with holes and killed by the Aurora mercenaries. Game Over, Meow.
Several hours later, Lisa wakes up manacled to a chair with a spotlight in her face and a jovial man asking questions. She spills everything and can feel an odd scar on the back of her head. Cortex bomb implant in place, she becomes Aurora’s operative and disappears from the shadows never to be seen again. On her first assignment, she is infiltrating an Aurora facility and steps into a elevator as a humanoid figure made of blood and claws materializes and shreds her. Goodbye, Lisa.

16 March 2064
The Day before St. Patty’s, the crew assembles in the Shamrock and is told by Murphy they’ll need to dress up for the next meet cause it’s at Matchsticks. Everyone but Grinder pays Murphy to acquire clothing. Grinder who has 98 yen to his name and has just been booted out of the Hilton to live at the No-Tell Motel, hops the mono to Redmond. He buys a 70 yen suit off Barney the Cheap Suit Guy who runs his biz out of a GM Stepvan and is known to be excessively friendly.
2000: The team arrives at Matchsticks via AngryJack’s Combat Cab and King tells everyone to act cool because it’s custom for the J to buy dinner. They go inside and order drinks.
2030: They are collected by the waitress who leads them to a backroom. They order a second round
2035: The J arrives with his two bodyguards. The team is to be paid 5K each to recover a briefcase that was taken from a courier of his by a gang called the Seven Plagues. They are given a week to do the job.
2100: Alex leaves without telling his team where he’s going
2110: The team decides that they need a vehicle for this gig. Grinder decides to steal Barney’s van. They call a cab and ride with Otis and his Hindi music for an hour. They are let off at the get off ramp in Redmond.
2215: A homeless ork wanders up and Grinder gives him the last 28 yen he has. This apparently sparks psychosis cause the sammy sprints off at high speed towards Barneys. Meow gives chase, leaving Lisa standing there a bit dazed.
2218: Meow comes to a screeching halt upon rounding the corner and nearly running into half a dozen trolls from the Rusted Stilettos who are passing around a bottle of RocketFuel and tell him he has to pay the ‘Troll Toll’. He balks a bit but realizes he’s not wearing armor and isn’t a troll, so he lies and says Grinder has his money. The lead Troll, Smash, asks if Meow will pay them to get it back. Meow says Sure. Smash pulls his Ruger and activates his ElectroMag Vision sighting in on the still visible running like hell Grinder half a block away.
2219: A fist sized chunk of brick explodes near Grinder’s head. He pours on the speed, darts into Barney’s alley where the friendly little man is sitting having a smoke. Grinder doesn’t break stride, just pops his spur and plunges it into Barney’s torso. Barney collapses instantly, bleeding everywhere as Grinder loots his pockets and jumps into the van.
2220: Meow sneaks away from the trigger happy trolls and heads back to the ramp.
2220: Grinder backs out of the alley and heads for I90 as Smash’s bullets rip holes in the van and shatter the windshield.
2225: Grinder stops at the top of the ramp and dumps all of the suits in the street. Homeless Ork Bob from earlier begins stacking them up as the sky opens up and it rains.
2230: Lisa reluctantly gets in the stolen van and Grinder takes off after Meow says he’s not riding with the crazy guy. He waits for AngryJack instead..
2300: ..who arrives with his rear turret firing at a helicopter. He does a screaming J-turn and the rear door gullwings open, allowing Meow to jump in. AngryJack plows his cab off the road and down into the woods as Meow is ping ponged around the back seat. A rocket explodes nearby taking out part of the forest. Meow covers his head and wishes he’d stayed home.
2345: Meow is let out at the Welcome to Seattle sign on I90 in a pouring rainstorm. He waits and contemplates his next move as a familiar black van pulls up. He decides to rejoin the team and they take the quick route through Downtown, Grinder and Lisa soaked and bedraggled from the lack of a windshield.
0005: Suddenly, red and blue lights in the rearview. Rookie Simms of LoneStar pulls them over and fails to ask for ID as Grinder tells a sad story of being jumped by go gangers. The rookie cop leads them to Roscoe’s Garage and takes off.
0020: Grinder rushes inside (apparently the madness was still in effect) and sells the van for 300 nuyen. The tired team takes the monorail to their respective homes and goes to sleep.
3 hours earlier…
2200: Alex arrives in Puyallup and accosts a vagrant, paying him 10 nuyen to find a ganger bar. The hobo points him in the direction of The Firepole.
2210: Alex wanders inside the bar and sees lots of men dressed in lots of leather and latex. He is somewhat taken aback that the bar is a gay ganger bar, home of the Leather Devils. He buys a drink and keeps his cool though. He finds a Devil and learns that the Plagues have set up shop right down the street
2230: Alex parks near the Plagues warehouse and heads up a fire escape, looking for a vantage point. He goes to the sixth floor where a curtained sliding glass door blocks the trid thats on inside. He can hear beer cans being opened. He knocks…
2233: And hears the drunk guy inside open his FRONT door and mutter fucking kids.
2235: He knocks again louder
2236: He hears the guy get up and cock a pump shotgun before whipping the curtain back.
2236: King asks ’How’d you like to make some money?’
2236: Drunk guy replies ’How’d you like to get blasted off my fucking fire escape?’
2237: King wisely leaves and goes down to the fifth floor where its dark. He uses his Killing Hands (CRASH!!!) to shatter the door and enter. Bloodstained chalk outlines, bullet riddled walls, and a urine smelling couch are all that is in here. But at least he has a clear view of the warehouse. He waits
2300: And waits
0200: And waits
0400: And waits
0800: And waits
1000: and finally calls the team to let them know he found the guys they were looking for. The team doesn’t want a cab and can’t take the mono to Puyallup since an eco terrorist group blew up the lines out that way so they call Chance and have him come get them in his tow truck.
1300: The team arrives at the buildings front and sees a maglocked grate. Lisa picks it and they enter, much to the consternation of the counterman who yells at them. Lisa pulls his gun and he ducks, leaving them to walk up the stairs unmolested.
1330: The team arrives at the crime scene tape locked door and Alex greets them. They plan
1430: And Plan
1530: and finally a buyer arrives down below for the case. Meow mentions stealing another vehicle since that plan worked so well last time. As luck would have it, a van with freshly bondoed holes and a new windshield pulls in the alley. The two runner types inside exit and head down the street towards the bar after locking it.
1600: The team is down by the van. Grinder is stymied by the locked door so he punches in the driver’s side window, triggering the car alarm that was recently (like last night) installed. He quickly pops the hood and disconnects the battery just as Lisa is twisting the hotwires together. He reconnects the battery and the alarm starts screaming again. The Plagues ork guards wander over to see what in the fuck is going on.
1610: Lisa pulls the alarm and YAY the team has wheels. Which is good cause the buyers are leaving with the case.
1630: The team ambushes the buyers and a swarm of concussion grenades and gunfire later, leave a shattered Americar and two bullet riddled dead guys in the middle of the street.
1730: They meet the J and get paid.

15 February 2064
Meet: 1700, The Shamrock, Grinder, Lisa, Alex, Chance, and Meow/Max meet Murphy who tells them the Johnson wants to meet them in Renton at 1900. Alex takes his motorbike, Chance and Meow take his sports car and the rest ride the mono as usual.
1900: The team arrives at 1125 Pine St #103 and is passed through by a large troll. They are met in the lobby by a chromed elf who leads them into a boardroom with tridscreens playing and then Mr. J exits a secret door.
1905: He tells them they are to extract Dr. Adrian Hall from a company called Aurora. The set up is they will be A/C repairmen. The J provides jumpsuits and namebadges. The team plans and waits for the call.
2000: Chance does a drive by with Meow and the two realize they don’t have enough radios for the team. These are necessary because they hired Quint the decker to run overwatch for them and he needs a radio frequency. Calls are made and Arnie agrees to see Grinder and Lisa, who take the work van to pickup the gear
2100: At Arnies, money is spent for 2 camcorders and 2 radios of questionable quality. The pair of runners race back to the rally point 2 blocks from the Aurora facility
2300: Various plans are made and discarded. It is decided that all of the runners will pile their weapons and armor in the trunk of Chance’s car. He launches his skidlid up over the building for eyes on the situation.
2315: The team arrives and is led into the site. They are patted down but the guards overlook the toolbags (which hold a taser). They are led up to the lab where Dr. Hall is.
2330: They poke around the A/C awhile then Alex decides they need different tools from the truck. The pair of guards watching them calls another pair to escort Grinder and Alex back to the truck while Meow and Lisa stay put.
2335: The second pair of guards arrive and lead Grinder and Alex away. One has a SMG in front and his partner is behind the two runners with a shotgun. In the stairwell, Alex kicks the legs out of SMG guard while Grinder spins and pops his spur. Grinder lunges at the guard, who grabs his outstretched hand and spins the samurai, kicking HIM down the stairs. Alex pulls the taser and shocks the SMG guard as Grinder jumps up…just in time to catch a blast from the 12-gauge. He goes down with a gaping hole and spurting blood where his collarbone used to be. Alex tases the shotgunner
2336: Meow and Lisa hear the guard’s radio ‘THESEGUYSAREATTACKING US!’ and both room guards aim their weapons in the runners faces. Lisa immediately begins stammering about how she doesn’t know these people and that it’s her first day. Meow pops his spur and tries to knock the shotgun away and stab. He slashes the guards chest, spraying blood and gore. Lisa kicks the SMG out of the other guards hand. The other guard quickdraws his Predator, prompting Lisa to dive for cover as he fires, clipping her bicep.
2337: Blood leaking from her arm, Lisa grabs the SMG and sprays a quick burst at the standing guard, dropping him. Meow stabs the other guard through the throat and is drenched from head to waist in arterial spray. He steps over and deftly kills the fallen guard as Alex and Grinder burst into the room, holding weapons.
2340: The team dresses Dr. Hall in an armorjacket as Quint cuts the camera feeds and locks the doors.
Chance spots the outside guards trying to get in and speeds his GM 3220 past the front gate, his Steel Lynx springing out of the trunk like a demented mechanical Jack-in-the-Box.
2345: As the team races towards their van with Dr. Hall in tow, Chance has Quint open the front gate so his drone can roll in shooting. One of the two guards trying to get in the front door goes down in a hail of gunfire that shatters the glass as the other sprints around the corner.
Another guard runs towards the cover of the gate house and is clipped. Chance rolls in and sees that guard is on his cellphone. He shoots, shattering the phone and maiming the guard. He finishes him off with a burst as he rolls towards the team van. His microskimmer’s camera shows another guard hiding near the teams van. Chance shoots but the guard dodges, causing a line of holes in the van. This continues for a few seconds before he finally catches a burst in the face, ending the showdown.
2348: The team bursts out of the loading dock and clambers into the van, putting the Lynx in and locking down its wheels. Improvised bandages prevent Grinder and Lisa from bleeding out but there is a mess.
2352: The van hurtles out of the open front gate heading for the Johnson’s office when suddenly a rotodrone with a minigun appears behind them. It fires but Alex manages to dodge, causing the rain of 7.62mm to stitch the pavement. It fires again and again but Alex keeps swerving until it runs out of signal range and has to turn back. Car alarms scream from the line of parked cars that are looking kind of shredded by the misses. The team pulls into an alley to discuss as sirens wail in the distance.
0000: Chance says no wounded in his car cause they will mess up his upholstery. He takes the Doctor instead as the team drives the tainted van back toward the J.
0010: Chance is paralleling the team and almost to Renton when the left side of Dr. Hall’s face explodes, covering the car’s interior with brains, blood, bone, and gore. Chance keeps it on the road and quickly pulls into an alley. He uses the spare jumpsuit they brought for Dr. Hall to clean most of the doctor off his windows.
0030: Alex, being the only unbloodied one, is sent in to tell the J they failed. When he explains about the cortex bomb, the J reluctantly pays them 2500ny each
0100: Chance takes Lisa and Grinder to Patch’s Clinic after dropping Meow at his apartment. Alex rides off on his motorbike.
The Radios, cameras, and Quint cost 10.5k. Grinder’s bill comes to 5000, Lisa’s is 1500. After it’s all said and done, the runners average 800 yen for this job.

Timeline
1800 Meet at the Shamrock w/ Murphy who sends team to LuChan’s Chinese Fast Food in Tacoma.
1900 Arrive at West Tacoma Monorail Station to see a guy with a shotgun shooting it out with two members of the Halloweeners. Lisa blocks the door open and then Grinder sprays the shades wearing guy but misses. Lisa jumps behind shotgun guy’s kiosk. Grinder ends the fight by throwing a concussion grenade which knocks the Weeners down and sends them running. Thier new compatriot says his name is Crash and he’s a member of the Brain Eaters and can he give them a ride anywhere since the law will be investigating shortly
1905 The pair pile into Crash’s pickup and he takes them to thier job, giving them his LTG and letting them know he owes them a favor.
2000 LuChen turns out to be a 40 something Chinese man who says a group of wannabe gangers called the Westside Triggers has been tagging his place, trying to break in, hassling his customers and generally being a pain in the hoop. They generally show up at closing time. He wants them gone but would prefer no bloodshed. He offers the two runners the use of the backroom and dinner. Grinder has General Tso’s Chicken, Lisa has Chili Beef Ramen.
2200 Having scoped out the alley, the runners decide to leave Grinder’s cell next to the dumpster with its camera on linked to his Image Display cybereyes. They then hide behind the rollup door and wait
0005 Four kids wearing yellow rainslickers and sporting green hair clamber over the fence. They are toting spray cans and crowbars. The rollup door slides up revealing two very large automatics pointed their way and glowing red cybereyes as Grinder sights in. One of them pisses himself and falls over the fence while the others scatter.
A call is made to Crash with the description and he says him and his crew will put the word out to the Triggers to get the fuck out of Tacoma
0100 LuChen pays the runners and they head home.

8 Feb 2064
Grinder, Alex and Lisa are hired by Murphy to go to the village of Shanchu in the Salish-Shidhe wilderness, pickup force 6 summoning materials and take them to an address in Redmond for a shady character named Kolmetz.
Timeline
1100: Meet at the Shamrock. Runners accept job and are given keys to Murphy’s van, 3 utility jumpsuits, a paracritter carrier and 1 day visas with export tags
0900 9 Feb: The Runners take off and soon arrive at the Border. There’s a tense moment as the Salish guard searches the van but no big deal
1200 9 Feb: Runners arrive in Sanchu and are hassled by Running Bear and his two buddies. They ignore the baiting though and head up the hill to Alrez, the talsimonger’s place.
1300 9 Feb: After cleverly stalling the van halfway up the hill, they hoof it to the talismongers. Alex and Lisa go inside, leaving Grinder as rear security.
1330 9 Feb: Alriz is an odd duck but gives them the goods, a box about 10kg. The runners head down to the van and beat feet for Civilization
1400 9 Feb: Due to Alex’s quick driving and enhanced perception, the Runners avoid a trap set by Running Bear and his chums. Grinder pops the rear doors to fire at the trio but an ice sheet spell causes the van to swerve. Grinder is hit by a stunbolt but the runners manage to flee.
1700 9 Feb: The Runners arrive at the address and find the old mailbox. They yell for Kolmetz and he comes out. Something about him trips Alex’s paranoia button and Grinder sets the box out the rear doors and the van squeals away.
1900 9 Feb: Run completed with the return of Murphy’s van and payment delivered.